Dallas Cowboys: Stephen Jones’ methodical free agency plan

The Dallas Cowboys approach to free agency is driving many crazy. But the director of player personnel, Stephen Jones, seems to have a plan.

Once again Dallas Cowboy fans are going crazy and bashing their team for not going out and signing big-name players to huge deals. Over the past few years, this has been the Cowboys approach and it has worked. And with Stephen Jones at the helm don’t expect any changes.

This team has been building through the draft and it has been working for them. This team has won their division three out of five years and continue to show improvement. Still many will look at Stephen Jones and complain that he isn’t doing enough and low balling players in free agency.

But to understand why this is not a bad thing for Dallas, one must try to understand the method to Jones’ madness in free agency. In the past, the Cowboys have been known to be big spenders in free agency and it didn’t get them anywhere. Now that Jones has taken over their new philosophy is to keep their own players and then find players that they feel brings versatility and high upside to the team.

Majority of the players that Cowboy fans want to see signed are players that are looking for big money deals or aren’t necessarily scheme fits. Those players aren’t going to be signed by the Cowboys anymore. Fans should expect and start tempering their expectations for players during free agency. Start expecting players that were in more of a rotational role on their previous teams.

Players like this give Jones and the personnel department more freedom in the draft to take players based on talent and scheme fit rather than need. If the team went into the draft needing players then they are going to draft players that may not fit a scheme and later regret that pick later on. We went through that for many years and I don’t want to go back to those days again.

So give Stephen Jones and the Dallas Cowboys a break during free agency. They are playing the long game while the teams you see spending a lot of money in free agency are trying to buy a championship like the Los Angeles Rams. And who beat them the New England Patriots, a team that builds rosters just like the Cowboys.