Aikman, yeah. He was breaking down physically pretty quickly, and his play reflected it. But Romo was still playing at a very high level at the time he signed his last contract. And there is no owner in the history of the league that would have let Emmitt leave and break the all time rushing record someplace else. That was why he was retained as long as he was. Emmitt wasn't completely used up, but was clearly not what he once was. And he was released the following offseason, once the record was secured.
Yeah point taken on Romo, especially since you had guys like Manning playing very late into their careers. But Romo had not proven durable, especially once the OL began disintegrating in 2009.
I disagree on Emmitt. I think only Jerry Jones would have signed Emmitt to that insane 6 year 48 million dollar deal or whatever it was back in 1996 and only Jerry Jones would have given Aikman an 80 million dollar deal with 20 million guaranteed given his dropoff and concussion history.
As good as Emmitt was in 1995 you had to know you were on borrowed time with him with all those carries from six nearly full seasons plus almost another season when you count playoffs. Emmitt was also showing signs of injury. Expecting him to finish an 11-12 year career as a Cowboy was nuts. Sure he did, but at the cost of our effectiveness.
And Jones' fixation kept us from even looking at starting caliber players who could compete with Emmitt. We instead went
explicitly looking for backups and passed on Curtis Martin in 1995 in favor of Sherman Williams one round
earlier. Just imagine how competitive the team might have remained if we'd taken Cumar.
Anyways, the more distant Jones gets from negotiations the better off we'll be.
