Cowboys owner Jerry Jones kicked off an eventful week for cornerback Morris Claiborne when he said what everyone else in the world already knew about Claiborne being less than what the team hoped to get when they traded up to take him sixth overall in 2012.
Claiborne then left the team’s headquarters on Tuesday after coach Jason Garrett told him that he wouldn’t be starting anymore, only to return the next day to resume preparing for this week’s game against the Saints. Claiborne said that he “knows I deserve to start” after returning to work and Jones reentered the picture on Friday by saying that he agrees that the cornerback has the requisite talent for that role, but that he needs to actually show the team he can handle the job before he can return to the first string.
“You’ve got to have an attitude, in my mind, if you’re out there at corner. He’s got -- and he knows as well as we do -- he’s got what it takes to be a starter. But you’ve got to show me. You’ve got to show the team. You’ve got to show the coaches, and you do that by what shows up on that tape. He’s got to put it on tape in practice. He’s got to put it on tape when he gets in the game,” Jones said on KRLD, via ESPNDallas.com. “He’s got to show that he’s going to be technically sound, that he basically understands his first assignment. Then we know that when given the opportunity, his athletic ability will kick in and he can play.”
Claiborne’s rookie contract is fully guaranteed, so he should get more chances to show Jones, Garrett and others that he’s capable of being more than a first-round disappointment. His work thus far says that those chances won’t go any better than the first set, but there’s nowhere to go but up at this point.
