Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones reveals decade-long battle with Stage 4 cancer
Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones revealed this week that he was diagnosed with Stage 4 melanoma in June 2010 and underwent four surgeries, two on his lungs and two on lymph nodes, over the following decade, according to the organization.
Jones, 82, received treatment at Houston's MD Anderson Cancer Center and later joined an experimental PD-1 immunotherapy trial, which he credits with saving his life. The longtime NFL owner now says he has no tumors and considers the drug a "miracle," the Cowboys confirmed.
PD-1 immunotherapy blocks the PD-1 protein to help T cells recognize and destroy cancer cells. Once experimental, it is now widely used. Survival rates for Stage 4 melanoma have improved from 35 percent to around 50 percent, according to medical statistics.
Jones recounts life-saving melanoma treatment
"You don't like to think about your mortality, but I was so fortunate to have some great people that sent me in the right direction," Jones said Wednesday from training camp in Oxnard, California. "I got to be a part of a trial... It's called PD-1, and it really, really, really worked."
Jones said his passion helped him overcome the adversity.
"When you're passionate, get totally engulfed in what you're doing, that helps you deal with some of the other issues we deal with in life," he said.
His cancer battle was hinted at in Netflix's America's Team: The Gambler and His Cowboys documentary.
Other Cowboys personnel affected by cancer
Other Cowboys personnel who have been diagnosed with cancer include Tad Carper, the organization's senior vice president of communications, who was diagnosed with Stage 2 cancer in 2024, and 51-year-old head coach Brian Schottenheimer, who survived thyroid cancer at age 28.
Schottenheimer referred to his battle at a news conference earlier Wednesday. He labeled Jones' fight with cancer as "amazing" and praised the billionaire owner for going public.
"I'm glad that Jerry shared it, just because I think it gives people hope," Schottenheimer said. "It gives people the strength to say, 'OK,' you know, 'Hey, you can beat this.'"
Schottenheimer reflects on personal thyroid cancer diagnosis
Schottenheimer underwent surgery in 2003 for thyroid cancer at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota.
"It doesn't discriminate against anybody," Schottenheimer said. "And mine was certainly less serious, but I was 28 when I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. Nothing like Stage 4, nothing like what Jerry and other people have to go through. But you hear that word 'cancer,' and it scares the hell out of you."
CBS News Texas will provide additional details as they become available.