Getty Images Free agent wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr.
Odell Beckham Jr. seemed to enjoy his visit with the Dallas Cowboys but the team has serious concerns about his health after seeing him up close.
Beckham visited the Cowboys on Monday after intense recruiting from the Dallas players and even Jerry Jones. However, the team looks to be changing its tune on adding Beckham due to concerns over his availability.
Beckham went through a physical with the Cowboys but did not go through a workout, which was a red flag for the squad. Jane Slater of NFL Network reported that Beckham left Dallas without a deal on the table, which seemed unlikely with all the build-up prior to the visit.
“I’m told there was no offer to OBJ made per a source informed. Serious concerns about ability to play this season,” Slater tweeted. “In the absence of seeing him run routes, seeing him cut…they are forced to evaluate the information they have. Doesn’t seem as optimistic as it was pre-visit.”
Slater noted that the Cowboys have taken risks on players coming off injury previously — citing Jaylon Smith and the recently extended Michael Gallup — but team doctor Dan Cooper did their surgeries.
Cowboys Want Beckham to Contribute This Season
The 30-year-old Beckham is coming off his second torn ACL and the Cowboys have been pretty clear that a signing would mean he could contribute this season, with Dallas having Super Bowl aspirations.
Micah Parsons was one of the Cowboys players who accompanied Beckham to the Mavericks game on Monday. He said that Beckham’s plan is to be on the field in five weeks, which would rule him out for the rest of the regular season.
“He told me five weeks. Five weeks,” Parsons said, via David Moore of the Dallas Morning News. “No trainer, no doctor, no anybody can tell a player who he feels. It’s your body. That’s for anything. Any part of your body [that’s] hurt. No one can tell you how your body is going to feel except for you. If that’s what he says, I always believe it. If they say no, my body hurts, I can’t go. You have to respect that.”
Jones also has been less optimistic publicly about the idea of adding Beckham to his 9-3 squad.
“I’m not confident at all,” Jones said, via Mark Lane of WFAA Sports. “And, so, that’s the issue. Now, we all realize that issue of health, that issue of availability is here every time. Just this one is very obvious and very pointed toward his injury that occurred last year in the Super Bowl. We got a good beat on that. We got a great read on his career.”
OBJ Rumors Weighing on Cowboys Players
The Cowboys are coming off a dominant 54-19 win against the Colts and are a 17-point favorite this weekend against the one-win Texans. However, the majority of questions this week have been about Beckham, which appears to be weighing on the players.
“It’s fair to say I’m trying to reach a Super Bowl,” Cowboys pass-rusher DeMarcus Lawrence said on Wednesday. “So if he can come and help us with that, then yes, I’ll accept him. But if we’re just gonna do the circus, no I don’t.”
Unfortunately, Beckham’s star power can attract quite the circus, which has been the case as he made his rounds with the Cowboys, Bills and Giants over the last few weeks.
Beckham stirred the pot himself with a tweet of a pawn emoji on Wednesday, which might be another sign of things not going as planned with the Cowboys. But the cryptic nature of the message makes it hard to determine what was truly behind it.