Jerry Jones: Cowboys haven’t had a “true No. 1” receiver for several years

The Dallas Cowboys are struggling in the wide receiver department this season. Not only are they failing to have success themselves, but part of the reason they just lost to the Houston Texans is because of a superstar wideout in DeAndre Hopkins.

It’s one thing to know something, but it’s another to have it rubbed in your face. Maybe that’s what happened to Jerry Jones because he’s been awfully cavalier with his comments about a “number one” receiver in the fallout of the loss.

The leading receiver on the Cowboys for almost the last decade has been Dez Bryant. Obviously Dez was released by the team this past offseason, but that was less than a year ago which makes Jerry’s comments on 105.3 The Fan Tuesday morning interesting. He noted that it had been “several years” since the Cowboys had a true top threat.

When Jones made his comments about not having one in general immediately following Sunday’s loss, they naturally stirred up questions:

• Why didn’t you get a No. 1 receiver then?
• Why did you only sign the players that you did?
• Why didn’t you draft someone who could be that player?

As always in situations like this, the questions aren’t all necessarily rational, but they happen in times like these. We weren’t the only one making remarks though, Dez Bryant made yet another plea to re-join the team that released him six months ago by inferring that he could be the player Jones is looking for.

A few things seem clear at this point:

• The Cowboys don’t have a “No. 1” receiver
• They haven’t had one in some time
• Considering Dez Bryant was on the team as recently as last season, the Cowboys didn’t view him as a “No. 1” receiver and therefore don’t right now when needing one desperately

Dez Bryant was a fantastic wide receiver across the whole of his career with the Cowboys, but is it really fair to say that he was a “No. 1” receiver over the last few seasons? Of course not.

What Dez did in 2016 was generally underrated as far as things go, and to his credit he dealt with his own injury and a quarterback change; however, the point remains that Dez never re-gained the form he had from 2012-2014 after he signed his contract extension in 2015.

That’s about it.