Cowboys’ Stephen Jones finally fulfills free agent promise with very boring kicker

Well. For several months, Dallas Cowboys EVP Stephen Jones has been promising reporters and fans that the team is “not done yet” in free agency. Would the Cowboys sign Bobby Wagner? Will they finally add Anthony Barr? Do they want to help a bruised offensive line?

Nope.

The big event we have been waiting for was for Stephen Jones to sign Lirim Hajrullahu who has a resounding four field-goal attempts and eight extra-point attempts to his name as an NFL kicker (sarcasm intended). Thanks for keeping to your word, Stephen!

The former Canadian Football League kicker is set to join Jonathan Garibay at training camp to give the undrafted free agent rookie some competition. Hajrullahu made his NFL debut last year with the Cowboys but had zero field goal attempts. He ended up with the Panthers towards the end of 2021 and made four of five field goals in Carolina.

The Texas Tech product will still likely get the starting job, but the Cowboys would’ve been remiss to not add some kicking competition for the young player in training camp. It’s just not exactly the exciting free agency activity we were hoping for.

Cowboys sign Lirim Hajrullahu to give Jonathan Garibay kicking competition at training camp

This obviously isn’t the 32-year-old’s first rodeo with the Cowboys. Although he never had a field goal attempt in his first game with Dallas, he did make all five of his extra-point attempts in the Cowboys’ dominating Week 2 win over the Atlanta Falcons. Maybe Dallas should have kept him over Greg Zuerlein considering how terrible he was at those.

The former CFL All-Star also spent five days with Dallas during 2021 training camp as a replacement for injured punter Hunter Niswander. He went on to be a member of the practice squad after Zuerlein’s Week 1 troubles before heading to Carolina.

Dallas certainly didn’t have a lot of kickers to choose from at this point in free agency, but hopefully, this gives the rookie a chance to really prove himself. Many Dallas fans are excited about Garibay given his great track record in the Big 12. The Red Raider made the longest field goal in FBS history last season (62 yards) and was a first-team All-Big 12 member.

The team certainly hasn’t invested much in the kicking situation this offseason, but ideally, anything is better than the inconsistency that Zuerlein brought to the table in 2021. Hopefully, Cowboys Nation won’t have to continue to hold their breath for every kick attempt in 2022.

Also, Stephen Jones… there are still other free agents out there! Wink Wink.