Once upon a time, the Cowboys beat the Dolphins in the Super Bowl. If the two teams somehow cross paths in the championship game in the not-too-distant future, Cowboys Hall of Fame quarterback Troy Aikman will definitely have a dog in the fight.
In an interview with Clarence E. Hill Jr. of DLLS Sports, Aikman made it clear that he’s now all-in for the Dolphins. It’s still not clear, however, what Aikman will be doing.
Aikman explained that he was approached by the Dolphins to assist with the General Manager search. Then, he was asked to help find a new head coach. Now, he’ll be sticking around.
“I’ll continue to help in ways that are yet to be defined,” Aikman said.
While Aikman’s specific role is TBD, the thinking is that Aikman can help the effort. In the same way that Tom Brady is helping the Raiders.
“I think all franchise quarterbacks that have been in the league for any length of time,” Aikman said, “I think we all come out of the game thinking that we could run a team, and know what it takes, and certainly having been a part of some championship teams, and I know what the locker room feels like, and what a winning locker room should be like.
“And so I really thought I would go in that direction when I was getting out of football, but because of things in my personal life, it kept me from really being able to devote time in that way. But, in the back of my mind, I kind of hoped it’d come along, and then, you know, I was so far removed at this particular time, I didn’t think it would ever happen. But so it’s kind of scratched that itch, but, you know, I don’t have any ownership. I don’t have the influence, if you will, that Tom seemingly has there with the Raiders. So it looks similar, but I’m not so sure that is.”
It is similar in one important respect that continues to be glossed over by the league and the broadcast networks. While calling games for all 32 teams, Aikman now has a clear interest in the success of one of them. And he apparently plans to leverage the things he learns in his primary job to assist the performance of his second one.
“I think the Dolphins were wise in understanding my relationships around the league,” Aikman said. “And knowing that I have information that they don’t have or can’t get. And I think they were smart in taking advantage of that — whether it was through me or through somebody else. The Cowboys have never elected to do that, at least with me. You know, maybe they have with others. But, no, I don’t feel there’s a conflict [with the Cowboys]. But I will say I’m pulling for the Dolphins . . . because now I have something at stake, and I think they hired two really talented, wonderful people, and I think that’s gonna prove itself out. . . But, yeah, I’m pulling for them. I want to see them do well because I feel like my fingerprints are on it as well.”
While there may be no direct conflict with the Cowboys until they play the Dolphins, the conflict of interest between Aikman’s main job and his side job is clear. And it will become an issue the moment Aikman shows up to visit another team’s facility and/or attend another team’s practice — especially if that team is on Miami’s 2026 schedule.
As to Aikman’s dual role, the league has said it will address the situation “at the appropriate time.” In the interim, Aikman will be in the draft room with the Dolphins, further cementing the fact that he’s on the payroll and working to advance the team’s interests.
Having a slice of equity doesn’t matter. Aikman is on the payroll. He wants the Dolphins to win. They’ve hired him, as Aikman said, due to the fact that he has “information that they don’t have or can’t get.”
His two jobs have clearly conflicting interests. One employer will expect him to gather information that will help him perform that job to the best of his abilities. The other employer will expect that the information gathered in the first job will be shared for strategic purposes in the second job.
Aikman is right about one thing: If the league is going to allow teams to hire broadcasters to funnel “information that they don’t have or can’t get,” every team should be smart enough to do it.
It all goes back to Brady’s dual role. The moment the league shrugged at Brady working as Fox’s No. 1 analyst and owning a piece of the Raiders, a bridge was crossed. Aikman is merely the second guy across that bridge. Unless the league burns that bridge down, any team that doesn’t follow suit will be at a competitive disadvantage.
Cowboys Clips
Arvell Reese may not make it past the second overall pick in the draft later this month, but other teams at the top of the draft order will be ready if he does slip past the Jets.
NFL Media reports that Reese has visited with four of the next seven teams on the draft board, including the three teams slated to pick directly after the Jets at No. 2. The edge rusher has spent time with the Cardinals, Titans, and Giants as well as the Chiefs. Kansas City has the ninth overall pick.
Per the report, Reese has also met with the Cowboys, who have the No. 12 pick.
It seems unlikely that Reese will be available if Dallas stays put, but the Cowboys do have a pair of first-round picks this year — the Chiefs do as well — so they could try to make a jump up the board if they are convinced Reese is their guy.
Texas Tech edge rusher David Bailey is one of the top prospects in the 2026 draft, a likely top-10 pick.
He spent the week visiting with the Cowboys and the Chiefs and took a top-30 visit to the Cardinals the week after the Scouting Combine, NFL Media reports.
The Cardinals draft third, the Chiefs ninth and the Cowboys 12th.
Dallas, though, also has the 20th overall pick, so it could seek to move up to select Bailey, who would fill a big need.
Bailey has also visited the Titans, according to Jim Wyatt of the team website. The Titans draft fourth overall.
Bailey, 22, began his collegiate career at Stanford before transferring to Texas Tech for his senior season. He earned unanimous All-America honors and was Big 12 defensive lineman of the year.
In his four-year college career, Bailey totaled 163 tackles, 42 tackles for loss, 29 sacks and 10 forced fumbles in 46 games.
Offseason programs will start getting underway around the NFL next week.
The ten teams that hired new coaches this offseason will be eligible to start working with their players on Monday, April 6. The Ravens are the only team that has set that as their first day of work while the Cardinals, Falcons, Bills, Browns, Raiders, Dolphins, Giants, Steelers and Titans have set Tuesday as their opening day.
All of those teams will also be able to hold a voluntary minicamp later in the spring. Every team is also scheduled to hold a rookie minicamp and a mandatory minicamp over the course of the next few months.
The first two weeks of work for all teams is limited to meetings, strength and conditioning, and physical rehabilitation only. The three-week second phase allows for on-field work, but no full-speed team drills while the third OTA phase allows for team drills, but there is no live contact allowed at any point in the offseason.
Most of the 22 teams with returning coaches will be opening their offseason programs on April 20 or 21. The Broncos have set May 4 as their first day.
Jadeveon Clowney tied his single-season high with 9.5 sacks while playing for the Ravens in 2023 and he left a good impression on quarterback Lamar Jackson during his time with the team.
Clowney is a free agent after playing for the Cowboys in 2025 and said this week that he feels he has a lot left in the tank. He also said, via Aaron Wilson of KPRC, that his year in Baltimore was “a great time” and that he’d be open to an encore.
Those comments made their way to Jackson on social media and he was asked if he’d like to be teammates with Clowney again in 2026.
“Definitely,” Jackson wrote on X.com.
The Ravens signed Trey Hendrickson as a free agent last month, but backed out of a trade for Maxx Crosby so they may still have their eye on adding depth to their group of edge rushers.
The Cowboys allowed the most points in the NFL last season, with the 511 points scored by opponents setting a team record. The team did not do enough this offseason to get new defensive coordinator Christian Parker enough quality players for a turnaround as he switches to a 3-4 base.
So, the Cowboys are widely predicted to use both of their first-round picks on defensive players.
At the NFL owners meetings this week, though, Brian Schottenheimer did not rule out selecting an offensive player with the 12th or 20th overall pick.
“What I love about the draft,” Schottenheimer said, via Joseph Hoyt of the Dallas Morning News, “is the unpredictability of it.”
The Cowboys traded for edge rusher Rashan Gary and signed safety Jalen Thompson and defensive tackle Otito Ogbonnia. They still have a glaring need at inside linebacker and could use another edge rusher and a nickel corner.
Still, Schottenheimer isn’t dismissing drafting an offensive player in the first round.
“I feel like we’ve set ourselves up to take the best player available,” Schottenheimer said.
In 2020, the Cowboys did not expect Oklahoma wide receiver CeeDee Lamb to fall to them. So, instead of taking a defensive player — cornerback Damon Arnette, defensive end K’Lavon Chaisson, linebacker Kenneth Murray, linebacker Jordyn Brooks and linebacker Patrick Queen were the next defensive players to be drafted — the Cowboys selected Lamb 17th overall.
“If the best player on the board is clearly an offensive player, then we’ll certainly discuss that,” Schottenheimer said, “and more than likely, knowing [Cowboys owner Jerry Jones], pull the trigger.”
The Chiefs are adding a former first-round pick to their defense.
Kansas City has agreed to sign cornerback Kaiir Elam, Mike Garafolo of NFL Network reports.
Elam, 24, split last season between the Cowboys and Titans. Buffalo traded him to Dallas at the beginning of the league year in March after his first three seasons with the club. Elam appeared in 10 games with seven starts for Dallas before the Cowboys waived him in November.
He signed with the Titans shortly thereafter and appeared in four games with the club over the rest of the season.
The No. 23 overall pick of the 2022 draft, Elam has appeared in 43 career games with 19 starts. He’s recorded eight passes defensed with two interceptions.
The Chiefs have voids to fill in their secondary after trading Trent McDuffie and losing Jaylen Watson in free agency.
As the Cowboys make a change to their defense, they needed to tweak the personnel to fit the adjusted front. That effort has included a trade that sent defensive tackle Osa Odighizuwa to San Francisco.
It wasn’t easy, for the player or his head coach, Brian Schottenheimer.
“Anytime you go through a scheme change, there’s going to be adjustments where you move on from an incredible person, an incredible leader in Osa,” Schottenheimer said this week at the NFL’s annual meeting in Arizona. “That was one of the hard ones. I’m happy to share with you guys: I wept, we both wept on the phone together. It was hard. That’s the nature of the business, and I’m thrilled that he’s going to a place that is a great fit for him.”
This is one of the realities that get overlooked by media who view trades as all-caps, exclamation point-worthy proclamations. For every goofy “TRADE!” tweet we see, there’s a human being who may not be thrilled about the sudden change in his overall work and life circumstances.
Odighizuwa, who has spent five years with the Cowboys, had no reason to want to leave. Especially with no state income taxes in Texas and a whopping 13.3 percent in California.
But that’s one of the realities of playing in the NFL. Absent a no-trade clause, any player can be traded. Whether he wants to be or not.
Every player is a piece in a football machine that will eventually replace each of them with a new part. And “the best interests of the team” always control those decisions.
The best interests of the player are secondary, at best. For most teams, the best interests of the player don’t even matter.
Especially when the team decides it’s ready to move on from the player.
The NFL announced earlier this year that the Cowboys would host a game in Brazil. The details were to be released at a later date.
Giana Han of The Baltimore Banner reports that the Ravens will be the Cowboys’ opponent in Week 3 in Rio de Janeiro.
It will be the first NFL game played in Rio and the first of at least three games to be held at Maracaña Stadium over the next five seasons.
The NFL played games in São Paulo the past two seasons, with the Packers and Eagles meeting in 2024 and the Chiefs and Chargers matching up in 2025.
The NFL will have a record nine international games across seven countries in 2026.
When the World Cup is played at AT&T Stadium this summer, grass will be the playing surface. So what would Cowboys owner Jerry Jones say if players asked him to keep the grass playing field for the NFL season?
“No,” Jones answered, when given that hypothetical.
Jones said it’s better for the Cowboys to use primarily artificial turf and that he doesn’t buy any claims that grass is a safer playing surface for the players. Jones even claims the players are better off on turf because it’s better for the Cowboys’ bottom line, meaning more money filters to the players.
“We have more flexibility with the way we handle our surface at the stadium. We have no belief that it’s any safer to play on grass,” Jones said. “The turf, actually like many things, improves the economics of being able to play this game and our players are the biggest benefactor of all. They get the best benefit of when we do good things financially, the players benefit. So I’m working for you, baby, if you’re a player.”
So why grass for soccer? Because FIFA requires it.
“I’m very comfortable putting some grass down for soccer under regulations and proud to be able to do it, but quickly getting the turf back there to get back to the other business of the stadium and the team,” Jones said.
