Garrett Wants The Best For Tony Romo, Declines To Name A Starting QB
By: Josh Clark
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DALLAS (105.3 The Fan) - Cowboys head coach Jason Garrett finally opened up about the Tony Romo and Dak Prescott situation at his final press conference on Monday.
Garrett said he wants the best for Romo heading into next season, but declined to get into any discussions over who will be the starting quarterback.
When Garrett was asked what his hopes were for Romo in the future, he went on to describe how great Romo has been for the franchise and what a great leader and teammate he's been.
"We certainly want the best for him whether he's here or somewhere else, Garrett said. "Good things will happen for Tony Romo ... a lot of things will play out here over the next few weeks."
When asked to how difficult it was to make the decision to name Prescott the starter for the rest of the season, Garrett went into detail to describe the dilemma.
"It was a challenging situation for everybody. One of the things that I think is important to understand in evaluating this situation ... Tony and I talked about this ... You know, he said very eloquently in his press conference that midway through the season it's a meritocracy ... and Dak has earned this opportunity. And in my visits with Tony after that, I said I agree with you but I think you misused the word meritocracy. Cause if you look at what he's done in his last 20 starts as a Cowboy ... he won 15 games and lost five of them. So when he had his opportunities, based on the merits, there's a compelling argument to be made that that guy should be your quarterback (Romo)," Garrett said.
"And the thing that was challenging for him and for everybody was these decisions were independent of each other. What happened when Tony got hurt ... Dak stepped in and this team got going and went on a run. And what we needed to do was somehow someway stay on that run. And those decisions we're kind of independent of each other. Cause based on the merits there's a compelling argument for Tony Romo, but the team was just at a certain place, and they were handling that situation so well that it was just in the best interests for us to continue down that road."
Garrett went on to add that Prescott and Romo handled the situation "beautifully" and because of that Dallas was able to achieve it's potential this season.
When asked if the team is committed to Prescott for 2017, Garrett said he "didn't want to get into all of those discussions right now."
"Dak Prescott certainly did an amazing job for us this year. He probably had the best year any rookie quarterback has ever had in the NFL, and he handled his opportunity as well as anyone I've ever seen both on and off the field. He certainly has a bright future with our organization and we'll talk in detail about what Tony Romo's situation is going forward."
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