Just when you think the Dallas Cowboys have found their rhythm — Mike McCarthy, Dak Prescott, 10-7, first-round playoff exit — Jerry Jones finds a way to disrupt it. Seemingly unsatisfied by his Sam Williams comments not getting the proper attention, the Dallas owner made sure he was in the news cycle Friday, trading a fourth-round pick for San Francisco 49er quarterback Trey Lance.
This won’t be an impactful trade, or alter the outcome of Dallas’ season; it’s just drama for the sake of drama. There’s little reason outside of injury to think that Lance will play, and that’s if he can usurp Cooper Rush, who was 4-1 in spot duty when Prescott went down with injury a season ago.
Jones is simply restless, and trying to shake the snowglobe before the season kicks off. While I’m sure he thinks getting the former No. 3 pick in the draft for a fourth-round pick is a shrewd move, I don’t know who he was bidding against. Lance is a third-string QB at this juncture in his career, and he desperately needs reps for that to change.
My thought was a seventh-rounder would be the most the Niners could get in return, because no GM would offer a pick of substance for Lance. With the new emergency QB rule, hold onto him as an insurance policy for a year. He knows San Francisco’s playbook; what’s the worst that could happen?
Well, Jones immediately handed someone his beer in the Cowboys war room, and acquired a player he hopes will be, what, a future backup? Kindle to start a fire under Dak’s ass? Dallas certainly isn’t known for developing quarterbacks. Sure, Tony Romo and Prescott are above average to competent, but mostly they just kind of stagnate, and wait to be let down by the coaching staff.
Motivation isn’t going to magically turn Prescott into a killer. It might generate a headline or two though.
San Francisco cuts, er, trades their losses
John Lynch and Kyle Shanahan’s opinion of Lance had clearly fallen low enough that a fourth-round pick counted as saving face. That said, when you look at the deal bluntly — the 49ers got a mid-round pick in exchange for their third-string QB — it’s a no-brainer.
I don’t know whether to call San Francisco’s approach to finding quarterbacks hubris, or ingenious. Botch a top-three pick, turn Mr. Irrelevant into a starter, watch three signal callers suffer essentially season-ending injuries, and then trade away depth at the position while also winning the deal.
We’ll see if it ends up mattering, but I’d venture a lie detector would reveal more than a little trepidation among Niner supporters over their quarterback room. Still, when your head coach can conjure up offenses from clouds of Bay Area fog and seventh-round picks, maybe not.
AL West the best division in baseball?
Probably not, but I’d just like to point out that the AL West currently has three teams in the playoffs, while the AL “Beast” only has two — and neither of them are the Yankees or Red Sox. That of course discounts the Texas Rangers’ now eight-game losing streak, but, hey, the Seattle Mariners are the hottest team in baseball.
The M’s 7-5 win over the Kansas City Royals on Friday night, coupled with the Rangers’ loss, moved Seattle into a tie with Texas for first place in the division. The Houston Astros are a game off the pace, but have been only slightly less awful than the Rangers of late.