Jerry Jones said he wasn’t looking to make headlines at Tuesday’s training camp press conference. Then he brought Max Crossby’s name right back into the conversation, without ever actually saying it himself. Asked whether Dallas would consider a trade to improve the roster before the season, Jones didn’t hesitate.

“I’d be very interested,” Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said during the team’s annual news conference to open training camp. “I’d give up the future to [get something] substantive to where we are today as to a player to give you an idea about what I invest, something substantive, to get the right kind of deal and improve us for opening day.

“I would. I feel that good about this team this year. Of course, you know that I haven’t seen this team play together, but in general, looking ahead, I think we’ve got a chance to be worthy of spending some future if we saw an opportunity.”

That’s when NFL Network’s Jane Slater pressed him on something specific: why Dallas had reportedly walked away from a Crosby trade earlier in the offseason.

“We didn’t,” Jones said. “There’s nothing more to elaborate on.”

He wasn’t finished, even as he tried to shut the subject down. Jones called Crosby “completely a Raider” and a “happy Raider,” adding that continuing the conversation would amount to tampering. He also added one more detail that read as more revealing than he probably intended.

“We understood his injury well,” Jones said. “We thought he could help us there. We’re surprised the way that was resolved.”

That comment lines up with how the whole situation actually unfolded. The Raiders had agreed to send Crosby to the Baltimore Ravens for first-round picks in both 2026 and 2027, only for Baltimore to back out after Crosby failed his physical over concerns tied to his surgically repaired knee. Because the trade was never officially completed, the Ravens were able to walk away cleanly.

Before that deal even came together, Dallas had reportedly offered the Raiders a first-round pick, a second-rounder, and additional assets of its own, an offer that didn’t get done. Once the Ravens pulled out, reports indicated the Cowboys remained interested, though other teams wanted more clarity on Crosby’s knee before making another run at him.

That lingering interest is exactly why Jones’s comments landed the way they did, months after Dallas’s own defensive collapse made the need for another difference-maker up front obvious.

Jerry Jones and the team’s interest in Maxx Crosby

Dallas finished 7-9-1 in 2025, its second straight losing season, in Brian Schottenheimer’s first year as head coach, and the defense was the clear reason why. The Cowboys allowed the most points in franchise history, and their pass rush barely existed without Micah Parsons, who’d recorded at least 12 sacks in each of his four seasons in Dallas before being traded. Jadeveon Clowney led the team with just 8.5 sacks, and Dallas finished with only 35 total sacks, tied for 22nd in the league. Clowney remains unsigned, and the team doesn’t appear likely to bring him back.

The roster around that pass rush has kept shrinking too. DeMarcus Lawrence left in free agency for Seattle, reuniting there with his former Cowboys position coach, now the Seahawks’ defensive coordinator. Osa Odighizuwa was traded to the 49ers for a third-round pick after starting 76 games and recording 17 sacks across five seasons in Dallas. Together, those exits leave a real hole at a position the Cowboys have struggled to fill even with Parsons already gone.

Dallas has tried to build around that gap differently this time. New defensive coordinator Christian Parker arrives from Philadelphia, where he helped the Eagles win two straight NFC East titles and a Super Bowl without a single player recording more than eight sacks in either of his last two seasons there. The plan in Dallas mirrors that approach, spreading pressure across several rushers rather than leaning on one star name, exactly the blueprint the Eagles used to keep producing without a Parsons-level anchor.

Whether that plan needs one more piece is the question hanging over Jones’s comments. He’s made clear he’s willing to spend future draft capital to get it, and with Crosby’s health status still the main obstacle standing between Dallas and another run at the deal, the next real test comes whenever the Raiders decide they’re ready to revisit trading him at all.