Jerry Jones: Dallas Cowboys will pay price but can win with Tyler Smith at left tackle
Dallas Cowboys coach Mike McCarthy has declined to officially announce rookie first-round pick Tyler Smith as the starter at left tackle in place of the injured Tyron Smith for the Sept. 11 season opener against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Owner Jerry Jones has already all but declared Tyler Smith the opening-day starter but admitted there will be growing pains.
“He’s got everything we hoped and more when we drafted him,” Jones said. “Do I wish we had Tyron? Yes. Will we get Tyron back? Likely. But in the meantime, he’s going to come in and get a Harvard Doctor’s degree in playing LT between now and then. Will we pay some price for it? Yes. Can we win with paying a price? I think so, yes.”
McCarthy refuses to acquiesce, citing competitive reasons.
He can’t deny the inevitable.
Even if the Cowboys sign 17-year veteran and nine-time Pro Bowler Jason Peters, who visited with the team and took a physical on Friday, he would not be ready for the season opener. Peters, 40, is a veteran insurance policy.
Smith, a Fort Worth native who played in high school at North Crowley, is the team’s only option to start and McCarthy’s players have turned down all opportunities to play along with the charade.
When asked about Tyler Smith moving to tackle this week after only getting reps at left guard in training camp and the preseason, quarterback Dak Prescott expressed optimism in his new blindside protector.
No one knows how he will fare against the Buccaneers in what will be his first game at AT&T Stadium since Pop Warner. He remains a work in progress in terms of technique and hand placement.
No one is worried about Smith doing whatever it takes to be ready and prepared for the moment.
No rookie has walked into the Cowboys facility as smart, confident, mature and grounded as Smith.
“Just when you meet Tyler, you just hang around Tyler, you see the competitor, the fighter, just the football player in him, that grit,” Prescott said. “And that’s what I expect to come out. I expect him to be prepared and the coaches and everybody get him ready, get him prepared, myself as well as the rest of the offensive line and the team and his confidence.”
Said Cowboys right guard Zack Martin: He’s very calm. He’s been great since the moment he got in here. He’s asked the right questions. He’s worked hard. He cares about it, which you can’t ask any more than that from a young first-round pick like Tyler. Again, he’s done a great job. He looks comfortable out there. It’s going to be a little bit of a learning curve. But I think he’s the type of guy who rises to the occasion. I’m excited to see him play.”
Martin said the main advice he has given Tyler Smith is to be himself.
“No one expects him to be Tyron Smith out there. He’s just got to go out there and play his game,” he said.
It’s no secret that the Cowboys drafted Tyron Smith to be Tyron Smith’s future replacement at left tackle with the initial plan of starting his career at left guard.
When the eight-time Pro Bowler Tyron Smith underwent surgery last week to repair an avulsion fracture in his left knee and is sidelined until possibly December, it forced the Cowboys to accelerate the timetable for the rookie top pick and move him from guard back to tackle.
It’s a challenge and opportunity that Tyler Smith embraces.
“I understood when I got drafted what an opportunity this was,” Tyler Smith said. “I’m just ready to do what I need to do for the team. Tyron getting hurt, it was tragic to me. Just having a dude like that, having a cornerstone of this team, having something unfortunate happen like that. It was a huge shock to the program for sure and I knew that whatever was asked of me, I would have to step up and fulfill that.”
Tyler Smith played tackle in high school and had 21 starts at left tackle in college at Tulsa the past two seasons where he developed into a first-round prospect with unique power and athleticism. So this move is going back home for him.
That he has been on the left side the whole time he’s been with the Cowboys makes the transition back easier.
“I’ve been working on the left side since I got here,” Smith said. “It’s been the same. They didn’t take me and move me to the right side where that’s a whole different kick leg and I have to worry about all these different things. I’m still generating power from the same areas. It’s just a different footwork, a little bit of a different stance. Just things that you’ve got to tighten up. But it’s like riding a bike. You’ve got to get back in there.”
This story was originally published September 2, 2022 at 12:06 PM.
