When Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers hit tight end Jared Cook on a seemingly impossible pass to set up the game-winning field goal on Sunday, all Cowboys safety Byron Jones could do was shake his head in disbelief.
Jones, who was the closest Cowboys defender to Cook but couldn’t quite get there to break up the pass, said on KRLD that
“It’s one of those plays where it’s just like, ‘Really, Rodgers?’ I mean, he threw a dime on the move,” Jones said, via the Dallas Morning News. “You don’t see stuff like that. Quarterbacks like that, they find those small holes in the zone and they can just take advantage of it, and Rodgers was able to do that.”
Jones says he defended the play the right way. There was just no stopping Rodgers.
“So we were in a zone coverage, Cover 2,” Jones said. “I’m an underneath dropper, and you know, we all understand what Rodgers is gonna do. We understand he’s gonna leave the pocket, so the play’s gonna be extended. The zone kind of gets all warped up when he holds the ball and he’s running outside the pocket. I kept my eyes on Rodgers like I’m coached to do and tried to defend my seam, and then of course you got Cook sneaking behind me and he catches it on the sideline.”
After that catch the Packers kicked the game-winning field goal, and the Cowboys’ season was over. Jones couldn’t do anything about it, and he doesn’t think there was anything anyone could have done to stop Aaron Rodgers.
