OL was the plan in 2013, but the Jerry panicked when guards went off the board early. I think it was something Jerry committed to Romo before his contract. He even admitted in the post draft press conference they were focusing on OL.
Jerry said: "Frankly, to the extent that we could stay within our grades, we put an emphasis on the interior of our offensive line".
For The Record: Cowboys Address Questions About First Day Of Draft In Press Conference - Blogging The Boys
However, anyone watching the war room cam that year, who is being honest with themselves, could tell that Garrett was angry, frustrated and confused. It certainly wasn't the look of a man who is directing the war room (because he doesn't)
Also from that press conference:
"If you look at our team and our roster over the last few years, we had a lot of really good football players who played well for us for a long time on the offensive line. But they were older guys; they were guys who made a lot of money and guys we loved having here. But we have had to transition from that group of guys, and you know the names, guys we loved having on our team, but we had to get younger.
We started that process a couple of years ago in drafting Tyron Smith. We feel great about that pick, and we made some moves in free agency last year to try to solidify different parts of our offensive line.
The infrastructure of football teams are your offensive and defensive lines. The best teams in the league are strong up front on both sides of the ball and we feel like we need to continue to get stronger there. That’s going to help our football team. You’ve heard me say it a lot, we need to run the ball better; running the ball better is going to make our offense better; it’s going to make our team better. And we are going to work very hard as an organization to run it better. That’s at the coaching level, but it’s also when you add players up front; we feel like they can help us."
So, in 2013, after the draft, he also spoke about wanting to run the ball better. And, he proceeded to tie the franchise record for fewest rushing attempts in a season.
From a text book, fundamental level, Garrett has decent ideas. The problem is, he simply can't execute them. The two TE approach is another example. OK, so he told Linehan he wanted to run the ball more. Great, Jerry neutered Garrett and took away OC responsibilities and you get someone who can actually execute what should be a fairly common sense tactic. I'm not sure that is a great trait in a coach. On paper, he can come up with good ideas, but it takes someone else to actually go make them happen. Do you really think if Garrett still had his fingers in the offense, they'd have committed to the run like they did this year? No way.
Shazier was the pick last year and they resorted to Martin once he was gone. So it isn't like they said "Hey, we're almost there with the running game, now that we can draft a first round guard, we can actually do it." No, they drafted Martin as a fall back plan because Barr and Shazier were gone. The only thing that really changed the offense this year was Garrett had his OC responsibilities fully revoked. Guess what, a run first offense can control the clock and limit the damage done by a weak defense. Plus it keeps your head coach from blowing games with a lead because you are inexplicably passing.
I also think the other thing they did was revoke Romo's ability to check out to a pass this year. Protect him from himself to a certain extent.
And, finally, if rebuilding the OL was a Garrett plan, why did he invest 2 picks in 2011, none in 2012, one in 2013 and one in 2014. Wouldn't he have focused on it sooner (and with greater numbers) instead of, for example, a corner (Claiborne) or a luxury second TE (Escobar)?
