Jerry Jones, the Dallas Cowboys owner and general manager, is a very wealthy man. And on Friday, when he was asked about why, as a wealthy man and the owner of the most valuable franchise in the history of American sports, he has been so reluctant to pay out for head coaches during his tenure running the team. Reports from the sports business site Sportico suggest that the current coach, Brian Schottenheimer, is the lowest paid coach in the NFL, at $5 million per year.
But, as Joe Hoyt of the Dallas Morning News noted: “One note: I see the Sportico figure being cited a lot about Brian Schottenheimer’s salary. I’d be careful with that. As the disclaimer from Sportico says, it’s an estimate because NFL coaching salaries are rarely public. Schottenheimer’s isn’t.”
Either way, Schottenheimer is at the back of the line on payment, a constant complaint from Cowboys backers.
Jones insists, though, that his approach to paying coaches is incentive-based, and that incentives get the best out of employees. As for being too cheap to pay coaches, Jones said in an interview on 105.3 The Fan on Friday: “It’s ridiculous. … I drill (oil) wells. I have five wells going right now that cost more than any coach.”
Jerry Jones Has Tried to ‘Lure Away’ Top Coaches to Cowboys
The argument, then, seems to be that Jones is too wealthy to be called cheap for not hiring expensive coaches, though the fact remains that he does not hire expensive coaches and it could be said he is getting what he paid for–Schottenheimer is a well-liked guy, but he is now 10-14-1 as the Cowboys coach.
Jones defended himself further: “The facts are I have been out there, and I have been trying to lure very successful coaches away from the teams they were on and knew full well that I was going to pay them for their success.
“So that has been done. No one knows that, but I do. And so it is absolutely ridiculous. And I actually grin when somebody says, ‘Jerry’s not willing to pay the money for what it would take to get the right kind of coach out there.'”
Cowboys’ Jerry Jones Fires Back at ‘Ridiculous’ Coach Accusation