{"id":873817,"date":"2026-04-24T21:06:40","date_gmt":"2026-04-24T21:06:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/873817\/"},"modified":"2026-04-24T21:06:40","modified_gmt":"2026-04-24T21:06:40","slug":"jerry-jones-had-the-exact-reaction-cowboys-fans-did-to-caleb-downs-robbery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/873817\/","title":{"rendered":"Jerry Jones had the exact reaction Cowboys fans did to Caleb Downs robbery"},"content":{"rendered":"<p id=\"inline-text-0\" class=\"mt-[18px] md:mt-0 mb-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-primary my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"5s\">It will probably take a few days to register that Caleb Downs is a Dallas Cowboy. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-1\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-primary my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"5v\">After all, nobody in their right mind thought the Ohio State phenom would fall outside of the top 10. That includes Jerry Jones &#8230; and everyone else inside the Cowboys&#8217; War Room, for that matter. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-2\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-primary my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"5y\">Addressing the media after a <a href=\"https:\/\/thelandryhat.com\/dallas-cowboys-fleece-eagles-trade-down-as-jerry-jones-crazy-draft-heater-continues\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">wildly successful first round<\/a>, Jones detailed the emotions he went through as Downs became more and more realistic (h\/t <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/VoiceOfTheStar\/status\/2047517359183688079\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Patrik Walker, DallasCowboys.com<\/a>). <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-3\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-primary my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"61\">&#8220;We had high respect for him. He was a prize for us sitting there \u2014 with the [fifth-rounders] or without them. &#8230; We had every reason to think another team would [move up] to try and get him.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys were full of emotional before drafting Caleb Downs <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-5\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-primary my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"67\">That describes every single Cowboys fan who was waiting for the Downs dagger. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-6\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-primary my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6a\">The board could not have fallen kinder for Dallas to start, as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.si.com\/nfl\/draft\/tracker?tab=rounds\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">offensive players made up three of the first four picks<\/a>. However, the Giants grabbed Arvell Reese at No. 5, before the Chiefs traded up to No. 6 for Mansoor Delane. Then, the Commanders took Sonny Styles at No. 7. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-7\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-primary my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6d\">That stretch seemed to be the nail in the coffin. No way four more teams would pass on Downs. That&#8217;s why you can never say never in the NFL Draft. Teams overthink blue-chip players every single year, and Downs was this year&#8217;s victim, likely due to safety not being a premium position. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-8\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-primary my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6g\">What are the Cowboys <a href=\"https:\/\/thelandryhat.com\/ohio-state-expert-says-what-every-dallas-cowboys-fan-needs-to-hear-about-caleb-downs\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">getting in Caleb Downs<\/a>? One article isn&#8217;t enough time, but we&#8217;ll run through the SparkNotes. He was the tone-setter for Alabama as a freshman and was the nucleus of a stacked Ohio State defense that won a National Championship in 2024. All at 21 years old. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-9\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-primary my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6j\">It will be some time before we see it unfold on the field, but Downs is going to unlock Christian Parker&#8217;s defense. If Parker could have handpicked one player in this draft to run his defense, it would have been Downs. <\/p>\n<p id=\"inline-text-10\" class=\"my-[18px] [&amp;_a]:text-primary my-f-1\" q:key=\"0\" q:id=\"6m\">The value of getting a player of Downs&#8217; caliber as late as the Cowboys did is still hard to believe. This feels a lot like when the league let CeeDee Lamb fall to Dallas at pick No. 17 in 2020. <\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"22\" height=\"22\" alt=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/assets.minutemediacdn.com\/platform\/google_discover_icon.svg\" class=\"shrink-0\"\/>Add us as a preferred source on Google<a aria-label=\"Follow thelandryhat.com on Google News\" href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/preferences\/source?q=thelandryhat.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\" class=\"flex h-[30px] w-[30px] shrink-0 items-center justify-center rounded-full bg-primary font-group-large text-sm font-medium text-white transition-colors hover:bg-secondary focus:bg-secondary md:w-auto md:gap-2.5 md:px-4 md:py-[5px]\">Follow<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It will probably take a few days to register that Caleb Downs is a Dallas Cowboy. After all,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":873818,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2066],"tags":[230,229,257,2461,7,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-873817","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-dallas-cowboys","8":"tag-cowboys","9":"tag-dallas","10":"tag-dallas-cowboys","11":"tag-dallascowboys","12":"tag-football","13":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116461724866300997","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/873817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=873817"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/873817\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/873818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=873817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=873817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=873817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}