Jerry Jones on Hardy + Brady + David + Goliath - Uncut and Untwisted
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IRVING - I could edit into an out-of-context soundbite or even twist into a grotesque misrepresentation
about what Jerry Jones said Friday on "G-Bag Nation'' about Greg Hardy, his statements, his behavior, Tom Brady and Gisele, Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, "guns a-blazin' and "David vs. Goliath.''
But having been on the receiving end of out-of-context soundbites and even grotesquely twisted misrepresentations, I think it best to let the owner's words speak for themselves … and for you the audience judge them on their merit and for yourselves.
To wit. Jerry Jones on 105.3 The Fan on Friday, uncut, unedited, untwisted:
WHAT'S IT GOING TO TAKE FOR DALLAS TO BEAT NE? -- "Well, it's going to take the absolute best that we are capable of playing, which means very few mistakes, the critical kind. Turnovers are obvious, but we don't need to discuss that. And it's going to take our defense really giving them a lot of concern and giving them a lot of really challenges. The good news is that I think we've got a chance to do it. I do. This is David against Goliath. That's good, because everybody does know David did get Goliath. So, it's possible. So, anyway, it's going to take that kind of effort for us. Offensively, we've got to continue to have minimal mistakes and we're going to have to make some plays. I know it's easy to say we've got to make them downfield, but we've got to get some 20 yards or more plays."
WOULD YOU LIKE TO COMMENT ON HARDY'S PRESS CONFERENCE? -- "Well, I specifically have commented on it. It's just where we are and where he is and where we are. Most of comments are going to go the wrong way if they have any element of being positive, of being aggressive, of being the way you want to be as a football player as far as your attitude is concerned. He has that attitude. It's not just talk. It's not just in front of a bunch of cameras. That's what he is. And he is that way. He is very aggressive out there. He is very positive. He is very confident in his ability to make a difference. Where he is and where we are is any time he is there, any time he is a point of discussion, which you guys maybe you were out there. But they probably asked him so many questions. I'll get so many questions and then I'll have five or six of them that have nothing to do with what the writer ultimately writes and he has it put on by some colleague of his the other way. So, you never know where it's coming from. Here's the deal: is that unless he looks like he's contrite, unless he looks like he's just absolutely whipped, and so really obviously sorry for what his situation is, he's going to get criticized. And we all know that. But he was in a football setting. Those questions that were being asked him. Those people that were asking that question, those were not workplace. We know some things are out of order. We know if an attorney is talking to you or if a sales person is talking to you and they're the opposite sex. We know some things in today's society that is behavior that we don't have today. We know that. But, now, I can remember when they talk about Richard Burton. And you'd say I don't know about Richard Burton, but anybody good enough to be married to Elizabeth Taylor has got to be all right. Elizabeth Taylor made her life wanting people to say she was pretty. She made her life. That was her complete life. That was the people she hired to make them when they said 'Elizabeth Taylor' to enhance people saying she was pretty and interesting. And, so, when you did talk about Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.
, you talked about how pretty she was and Elizabeth Taylor. Nobody thought that you were being disrespectful of women or the workplace. Well, Tom just happens to be married to a lady that is just absolutely one of the premier people in the world of working and making people say she is beautiful. Do you agree with me? That's what they do. They get up in the morning and go to bed at night having people say she's beautiful. So that a lot of people when they talk about Tom Brady talk about how beautiful she is."
WOULD IT BE BEST IF HARDY DIDN'T ADDRESS REPORTERS? -- "You can't do that. That's the day, as you know, in league rules, you cannot not do that. The players are obligated to talk. I agree with you. I can't tell you the people that write me notes and call me and say, 'Why don't he just not talk? Why don't he avoid it?' Because that's against the rules. You've got to talk.
"Now, let's just look at it. Does anybody really think that what he really was alluding to and saying my guns are going to be blazing? You know something. More often than not, when you see players -- now I don't know if this is the case -- but when you see players and interview players. More often than not, they're saying what their coach has just been saying to them all week. They've had it. It's a theme. This week we're going to circle the wagons. This week we're going to do this. This week we're going to do that. More often than not, you'll see a player step up there and say what his coach. I don't know. I really don't know and I haven't even asked, but they very well could have been the theme for the week. 'Let's go out guns blazing.' By the coach! You never know that."
"And I'm not so sure it's taken out of context. I want you, anybody to understand that I do understand the sensitivity that is going on. But did anybody think that this wasn't going to be the case when he came back for the first ballgame, that there wasn't going to be a featured point by the country? So, you know, the hand writing was on the wall. So, now, you say, okay, why did you deal up a mess of that? Because there are other things to think about here. And I'll be very upfront. Certainly I'm trying to improve the football team. Absolutely I'm trying to improve the football team. But I'm going to say something else too. I have seen people that can, not only improve the football team, but have a contribution to make as far as the things that happen in society. Now, nobody living, long before the Cowboys, I was head of for years, over 10 years, chairman of Battered Women of Arkansas. And I got Eddie Sutton and Nolan Richardson to come play free basketball games and use the ticket proceeds to go build safe houses. And I've been in safe houses and have been a part of watching them be built and walked through them. And there's a whole bunch of people talking here that haven't been in a safe house. So, it's not about not being sensitive to battered women, but that has gone on and since the domestic violence. But that has gone on around the life that I've chosen, that's been going on for 30, 40 years. That's not being over-sensitized to it. I just want everybody to know we're very sensitive to that issue."
WHAT DO YOU SAY WHEN FOLKS THINK YOU CARE ABOUT FOOTBALL OVER DOMESTIC VIOLENCE? -- "I would say to you that I don't have that lack of sensitivity in my background on a personal basis if you want to look at it personally is what I just said. Long before the Cowboys, I was actively giving money and raising money for the family of the abused and trying to work for rehabilitation. And, by the way, one of the things that I did learn a long time ago is that it really exacerbates things if you take them out of the workplace, if you take the abusers out of the workplace, that it really just goes downhill from there and then they get desperate. And all of a sudden, you end up in a worse situation."
NO ONE EXPECTS DALLAS TO HAVE A CHANCE SUNDAY -- "Those, in a way, I don't like the circumstances that cause you to be David against Goliath. I don't at all, but by the same token, those circumstances are really intriguing. I'm not going to say fun, because that's not the word either. But they are very intriguing in sports. And, yet, yes, they are actually a challenge to prepare. And certainly, again, I can't keep but referring back to it, but David was pretty aggressive with Goliath. So, there is a lot to be said when the bigger and the best hit him on the nose."
IS BRANDON WEEDEN'S JOB IN TROUBLE? -- "I didn't see how it was interpretted that way. But I accept if there were interpretations like that. And he's in a highly competitive situation. He's challenged, but we all see that. Here's a guy that has limited started experience, is relatively young, and has got quite a burden on his shoulder. Everybody sees that, and he's the quarterback of the Dallas Cowboys. Now, as far as how he has played, the last three games he's played in, he's held a really good accounting of himself in my opinion. And he is not the reason that we have lost in the last two. And, so, I will really tell you that I can't giv him a 'he better show or else' type definition. I think, from everything I see, I think he's on course to maybe being what we would like to have."
HOW MANY TEAMS YOU WANT IN L.A.? -- "I think that L.A. will be amazing for sports and amazing for the NFL and amazing for those fans with one or two. And, so, my preference is not an issue. What is though is important that they do have passionate organization, passionate people. We can't miss on L.A. It's got be done absolutely right. The world is looking at the NFL and the world is looking at what we're going to be doing in L.A. And we have a lot of good things going for us in the NFL. We need to that one in step with the perception of doing things right."
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