No NFL owner is more involved with his team than Jerry Jones of the Dallas Cowboys, and he showed that again Monday night in his team's 20-17 loss to Washington. After quarterback Tony Romo went into the locker room with a back injury, Jones went in with him before returning to the sideline to tell head coach Jason Garrett that Romo would be available to return, according to Clarence E. Hill Jr. of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
Jerry Jones told Jason Garrett that Tony Romo ‘would be back’
Dallas has its own unique way of handling business, proven once again in a bizarre scene on Monday night.
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The television cameras picked up the visual of Jones speaking with Garrett during the fourth quarter, a moment most NFL coaches would not dream of having in a tight game. However, Jones is famous for popping up on the sideline and has been doing so since buying the team in 1989.
While Romo was being evaluated in the locker room, backup Brandon Weeden surprisingly led the Cowboys to a pair of scores, giving Romo a 17-17 game to return to with two minutes remaining. Despite the conjecture during the broadcast of who would be in for the final drive, Garrett was aware Romo could go after speaking with Jones:
“I was here during the tail end of the examination and knew he planned to come back out and play if he were needed,” Jones explained matter-of-factly. “Of course he was needed. I felt good that he could come back out. When he saw the opportunity he did. I told Jason that he would be back in.”
Jones admitted afterward that Romo certainly was not 100 percent when coming in to be evaluated, but eventually felt good enough to play again.
“We knew there were no structural issues when they gave him the X-rays,” Jones said. “I very concerned the fact that he laid there as long as he laid there. After we looked at the play and saw that was a knee kind of to the side of the back, then we felt better about it.
“We got him in here and looked at it real carefully everybody felt better about it. But he was certainly limited when he first got in here, but he loosened it up real good and went back out.”
Dallas is back in action this Sunday, hosting the 6-1 Arizona Cardinals.
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