Covering the Dallas Cowboys is a job unlike any other, not only because of the size and intensity of the fan base, but also because you just never know what kind of show team owner Jerry Jones is going to put on. That was well on display on Wednesday at The Star when, near the end of the team’s NFL draft press conference, as Joseph Hoyt of the Dallas Morning News was innocently asking about the Cowboys’ draft-and-develop history, Jones mentioned that President Bill Clinton had just arrived.
No one was quite sure, it seemed, whether to believe him, until sure enough, Clinton popped up in a doorway, smiling. The two Arkansas natives, Jones and Clinton, then shook hands and started a fully mic-ed up conversation, with Jerry Jones praising the team’s press corps as Clinton told him, “Have a good draft day.”
Said Jones, “Something important we share, we really do, they’ve elected to spend their lives in sports. That’s why they’re here. And they could have been doctors or lawyers, but they want to be in sports. So when they kick my you-know-what, and they do, I say, guys, we’re actually cousins because we both elected to spend our lives in sports, so be a little sweeter.”
And, in typical Jones fashion, he added, “This will unquestionably be the biggest press conference going on in the NFL today.”
President Bill Clinton Zings Jerry Jones at Cowboys Presser
Certainly, it was the only presidential press conference around the NFL on Wednesday, and leave it to the Cowboys to pull it off. While Clinton did not get Jones to reveal any of the Cowboys’ secrets as far as draft plans go, Jones did intimate earlier that the Cowboys are considering moves both up and down the board, as has been frequently documented by draft gurus across the league.
And, for good measure, there was a bit of an old Razorback back-and-forth for the duo, as Clinton poked Jones about his time as a football player in Arkansas.
Said Clinton: “Tell them again the position you played.”
Jones responded: “Well, I was a guard, I was a pulling guard.”
Clinton: “And how much did you weigh?”
Jones: “About 185 pounds.”
Clinton: “And a couple years before that, they had a guard named Wayne Harris who weighed the same amount Jerry weighed, and he made first-team All American. They were great guards. Different world now.”
And when Jones said he’d hate to have to block some of the modern defensive linemen, Clinton was ready.
“Yeah, you’d be the late Jerry Jones,” he said.
Cowboys Press Conference Crashed by US President