Tony Romo is at a crossroads in his career. His options: walk away from football or be forced to play football for someone other than the Cowboys. Jerry Jones still believes he can keep Romo around, but that is a pretty far-fetched reality even for a guy as creative as Jones.
The Cowboys are delaying Romo’s decision by waiting to make a roster move with the veteran QB, and it’s possible that the team could wait until well after the draft (and on into June?) before actually pulling the trigger. Dallas wants to get something in trade for Romo, but that’s looking pretty unlikely at this point. This may or may not have to do with Jerry Jones dealing with the emotions of Romo possibly playing for another Texas team.
But maybe Romo doesn’t want to play anywhere else. Just two years ago, Romo was reflecting on what it would mean to go somewhere else and win a championship and he sounded oddly uninterested in playing for another team and chasing a title.
Specifically, Romo told 105.3 the Fan’s “Ben and Skin Show” -- a CBS Sports Radio affiliate -- that he wouldn’t really want to walk into some other random city (he used Seattle as a hypothetical) with a random team and just win a title with pieces that were there for him.
“Let’s say it was Seattle a year ago. You go out there and win a championship. Congratulations you went out and picked a spot and won a championship and it was set up with a lot of the pieces and blah, blah, blah,” Romo said. “And then you go back and live in Dallas and congratulations, a lot of people in Seattle like you.”
Then he continued about the importance of winning with the team he “grew up with” and “started off with” and finding the joy in winning with that specific team and even the state of Texas.
“It’s about the team you grew up with, the team you started off with, you put everything into it. The joy comes from actually accomplishing it with so many people, and the fans and the state,” Romo said. “And I’m going to be here for good, so I would just rather fight until the end and give everything I had and leave it out for there for the Dallas Cowboys then go somewhere else and do something special for a halfway little couple of years. It just doesn’t seem that would be enjoyable at all to me.”
Major kudos to the guys at 105.3 for setting the quote to “Friday Night Lights” music.
It’s been two years since that quote happened (as we understand it -- either way time has passed) and maybe Romo is taking this whole departure from the Cowboys personally.
Certainly two years ago he didn’t think he’d get supplanted by Dak Prescott and pushed out of Dallas the way he’s being pushed out.
But he might still feel this way, that walking out of Dallas and into another location -- whether it’s Denver or Houston or wherever -- and ultimately that could end up heavily impacting his future.
Maybe that emotional goodbye was to more than just Cowboys fans.
