The Cowboys on Thursday signed undrafted free agent OT La'el Collins to a three-year, $1.65M deal, and Owner Jerry Jones "couldn't stop grinning," according to Charean Williams of the FT. WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM. A source said that a team drafting in the top 10 was "prepared to select Collins," until "word broke that Baton Rouge, La., police wanted to question Collins on the murder of his pregnant ex-girlfriend." Collins "left Chicago the day before the NFL Draft started." An NFL employee "escorted him off the makeshift field at Grant Park following a Play60 event April 29, and he flew back to Louisiana to meet with police." Even though investigators said that Collins "was not a suspect in Brittney Mills’ death on April 24, the cloudiness of the situation scared all 32 teams enough that he went undrafted" (FT.WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM, 5/8). In Dallas, David Moore reports the deal will pay Collins roughly $8M "less than if [he] would have been taken in the first round" (DALLAS MORNING NEWS, 5/8).
SECOND CHANCES: In Dallas, Kevin Sherrington notes Collins on Thursday spoke, "unscripted, for 20 minutes." To say he was "impressive would be an understatement." He was "forthright, earnest, passionate, eloquent and above all else, believable." Unless there is "more to the LSU story" than the public knows, the acquisitions of Collins and DE Randy Gregory, who slipped to the Cowboys at No. 60 in the Draft primarily because of off-field concerns, "shouldn’t be cause for undue alarm" (DALLAS MORNING NEWS, 5/8).
JERRY'S WORLD: In Ft. Worth, Mac Engel wrote once Jones "got personally involved, it was over." Engel: "Unless you have experienced the polar vortex of persuasion that is Jerry Jones, you cannot imagine what this man’s charm and personality can do." This "means the Cowboys won" the '15 Draft. Collins "met with several teams, and on Wednesday night he met with" Jones at his house in Dallas where several other high ranking members of the organization, as well as QB Tony Romo, were there "to help on the recruiting pitch" (STAR-TELEGRAM.com, 5/7). USA TODAY's Nate Scott writes under the header, "Jerry Jones Can't Resist Trying To Prove The Rest Of The League Wrong." The fact that it was the Cowboys who signed Collins "caused more than a few eyebrows to raise." By signing him, Jones "proved that he just can’t resist a headline." Scott: "The Cowboys are the greatest show on earth, and when it comes to headlines, the more the better" (USA TODAY, 5/8).
