When the Cowboys took Randy Gregory late in the second round of last year’s NFL draft, many people thought they had gotten a steal, as some draft analysts projected Gregory as a Top 10 pick. But it hasn’t worked out that way.
Gregory missed four games with a sprained ankle and only played sparingly when healthy last year, and now he’s suspended for the first 14 games of this season for multiple violations of the league’s substance abuse policy. And Cowboys coach Jason Garrett acknowledges Gregory hasn’t panned out.
“It’s disappointing he hasn’t played a lot of football for us. There’s no question about that,” Garrett said, via the Dallas Morning News. “We’ll continue to try to provide the right structure for him both at the team level and the league level, and hopefully he’ll respond the right way.”
The Cowboys knew what they were getting into when they drafted Gregory, as he failed a drug test at the Scouting Combine. But Garrett still has hope for him.
“The biggest thing for him is just to take it day by day, understand the consequences of his behavior and live with those consequences and do everything he can from this point forward to get himself right,” Garrett said. “The league came down with that ruling, and he has to live with that; we have to live with that. It ain’t changing, so you go back to work and you focus on doing what you need to do to get yourself better each and every day.”
Maybe some day Gregory will show why he was considered such a major talented pass rusher heading into the draft. But for now he’s stuck on zero career sacks.
