Cowboys defensive end Jadeveon Clowney said after the team’s Christmas win against the Commanders that he’d like to remain in Dallas next season and that he’d like to get a new deal done early enough to ensure he goes to training camp with the team.
The feeling appears to be mutual. Cowboys executive vice president Stephen Jones said on 105.3 The Fan on Monday that the Cowboys plan to have conversations with Clowney about a new deal sooner rather than later.
“We’ll be talking with his guys right away . . . With his willingness to want to be here and us wanting him to be here, hopefully we can figure something out,” Jones said, via Tommy Yarrish of the team’s website.
Clowney did not sign until the regular season was underway in September, but is tied with James Houston for the team lead with 5.5 sacks this season.
The Vikings, who had started the season 10-0 before finishing 12-2, hosted the 10-4 Cowboys, who were the wild-card because the Cardinals (yes, the Cardinals) had won the NFC East. The Vikings led late, 14-10. It didn’t last.
Fueled by a pair of controversial plays — starting with a completed pass to receiver Drew Pearson on fourth and 17 that the Vikings insisted was not caught in bounds. But that’s the forgotten footnote. The centerpiece of that game was the 50-yard touchdown pass to Pearson that coined the phrase “Hail Mary.”
Said quarterback Roger Staubach after the game, “I closed my eyes and said a Hail Mary.”
The intervention on the back end of the play was far less than divine. The Vikings continue to believe Pearson shoved cornerback Nate Wright to the ground as the ball was coming in. There’s never been a clear view of the action. Obviously, Wright fell. Was he pushed? That question has been part of the allure of the play for half of a century, as of today.
Vikings fans have always felt otherwise. For some, like a 10-year-old boy growing up in West Virginia who was bawling on the kitchen floor after the game, it still hurts. But at least I didn’t get hit in the head with a whiskey bottle, unlike game official Armen Terzian. (So much for Minnesota nice.)
Lost in the controversy is the fact that the Vikings didn’t see fit to double cover the most dangerous weapon on the Dallas offense. Safety Paul Krause arrived just late enough to complain about the lack of a penalty flag on Pearson.
Regardless, the play stood. The Cowboys advanced. And they ultimately lost the Super Bowl to the Steelers.
That’s the silver lining in a dark day for the Vikings. But for the Hail Mary play, the Vikings would have been in line to lose their third straight Super Bowl. Which, based on what happened the next year, would have been four in a row and five overall.
While the Vikings attempt to extend the expiring contract of defensive coordinator Brian Flores, it won’t matter if another team wants to hire him to be a head coach. It will matter if another team is thinking about hiring him as its next defensive coodinator.
There could be more than one. But one such team that is lurking is the Cowboys.
Dallas seems to be destined to fire defensive coordinator Matt Eberflus, after a disastrous reunion year. (Never mind the fact that owner/G.M. Jerry Jones traded the defense’s best player 10 days before Week 1.) And the increasing chatter in league circles is that the Cowboys will be firmly in play for Flores.
The Vikings, we’re told, are keenly aware of the possibility. And while the Vikings should have exclusive rights to negotiate with Flores until his contract expires, we all know by now that tampering is as rampant in pro football as flopping mouthpieces that never seem to make their way into players’ mouths.
Jerry Jones loves to talk a big game. Will he put his money where his mouth is? He has a low-key reputation for being cheap. Rex Ryan claimed last year that he would have been hired instead of Mike Zimmer to be the defensive coordinator for the final years of the Mike McCarthy regime, but Jones “couldn’t pony up the money.”
Flores could be the winner, either way. If Jones decides to give true credence to his periodic claim about the size of the check he’d write to win a Super Bowl, he’ll put real cash on the table. Which could spark a bidding war for Flores, between Dallas, Minnesota, and whoever else may decide to try to hire him.
The other factor in all of this is whether the Vikings truly want Flores back, or whether they want to create the impression that they tried to keep him. As we learned when canvassing high-level personnel with multiple teams about Flores’s head-coaching prospects in the coming hiring cycle, his Belichickian style hasn’t always meshed with Minnesota nice.
Still, coach Kevin O’Connell will (or should) have plenty of say in the final decision as to how much the Vikings will pay to keep Flores. Given O’Connell’s gentler touch when it comes to working with others, Flores provides balance. And if/when the Vikings get their quarterback position figured out, the upside in Minnesota could be higher than it is in Dallas.
For now, it’s fitting that the two franchises could be squaring off for Flores. It’s the 50th anniversary of the most memorable, and controversial, on-field meeting of the Cowboys and the Vikings. The question for now could be whether either team ends up making a successful Hail Mary play for Flores.
Defensive end Jadeveon Clowney isn’t ready to walk off into the sunset and he isn’t planning to approach the coming offseason the way he approached 2025.
Clowney didn’t sign with the Cowboys until the regular season was already underway and he said after Thursday’s 30-23 win over the Commanders that he’d like to settle his plans for 2026 a bit earlier in the calendar. Clowney said that he’d be happy to return for a second season in Dallas while adding that he hopes to go to training camp with whatever team he winds up signing with next year.
“Oh yeah, if they’re willing to bring me back, but, yeah, I’m pretty sure I’m definitely gonna play,” Clowney said, via the team’s website. “I got a lot left in the tank. I ain’t gonna go sit on my couch. I’m gonna stay ready. Maybe sign a little bit earlier, and I’m trying to go to camp next year so I can get the rust off me and get going. I’m looking forward to it.”
Clowney had four tackles, 1.5 sacks, three quarterback hits, and three tackles for losses on Sunday, which was a good way of showing what he has left in the tank. He’ll get one more chance to do that against the Giants in Week 18 before turning his attention to his 13th NFL campaign.
Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott took a lot of hits in Thursday’s win over the Commanders and said after the game that he’ll “probably wake up a little sore” on Friday.
The soreness resulting from the six sacks and 11 quarterback hits Washington dealt him on Thursday aren’t enough for him to change his tune on playing against the Giants in Week 18, however. Prescott said before this week’s game that he wanted to keep playing despite the Cowboys being out of the playoff race and he said the same in his postgame comments on Thursday.
“For sure, no question,” Prescott said, via the team’s website. “I love this game, I love any opportunity that I get to play it. That being said, if I get to go out there, I’m going to give it my best, prepare the same way, I’m going to be the same player that you guys know. I understand, the reasons why maybe not, and if I’m approached with that, I’ll handle that then.”
Head coach Brian Schottenheimer would be the person making the approach and he didn’t commit to anything on Thursday.
“It’s Christmas, I’m going to enjoy Christmas, man,” Schottenheimer said. “I’m going to have some eggnog and I’ll deal with that when I get looking back at the film.”
The Cowboys will finish the season at 8-8-1 if they beat the Giants and we’ll find out next week if that’s enough of a lure to send Prescott back out on the field.
