Lucky Whitehead should be on the Dallas Cowboys right now. Sure, he’s not exactly the centerpiece of one of the top offenses in the NFL, but the Cowboys’ depth chart should include the third-year player out of Florida Atlantic at wide receiver and return man.
Unfortunately for Whitehead, that will not be the case. He was cut by the Cowboys on Monday, which wouldn’t have raised too many eyebrows if it happened because of his career production. Between punt returns, kick returns, receptions, and rushes, he has touched the ball 106 times in two years for 1,404 yards. 77 of those touches and 1,151 of those yards are on kick and punt returns, which means he’s more “return specialist” than “receiver” at this point in his career.
But instead of cutting Whitehead for his on-field performance, the Cowboys cut him for a 1-2 punch of getting charged with shoplifting in Virginia in June and failing to appear in court a few weeks later. Considering the — how do we say this — caliber of people who have been on the Cowboys in the last few years, cutting someone for these reasons is a peculiar decision.
Here is what Whitehead said when asked about these charges: “I didn’t know about that. I don’t know what’s going on.”
It turns out this is 100 percent true: Whitehead was not arrested for anything. The local police in Virginia said they were working to clear Whitehead, and apologized to him and his family. As it turns out, the person who claimed to be Whitehead gave the cops Whitehead’s name, date of birth, and social security number.
The Cowboys —- namely head coach Jason Garrett —- didn’t back down, though. Whitehead said that he was “pretty much being called a liar,” and Garrett said this, via NFL.com:
“As we gathered more information on that particular situation and conversations we had with Lucky about that particular situation and we put into context with his career with us over the last year or so, we just felt like the best decision for the Dallas Cowboys was to release them,” Garrett told reporters. “We felt like that’s good for us going forward and hopefully it’ll be good for him going forward. A little bit of a wake-up call to handle these situations the right way.
“When you have someone in your program, in this environment, in this structure, and they don’t grow and develop and they make the same mistakes over and over again, it’s time to move on.”
… huh?
The Cowboys literally employed Greg Hardy for a year, then cut him for being in bad physical shape as the season wore on, because he kept partying. Ezekiel Elliott was accused of domestic violence earlier this week. Linebacker Damien Wilson was arrested for two counts of assault with a deadly weapon three weeks ago. In May, cornerback Nolan Carroll was arrested for DWI. Garrett claims they cut Whitehead so he could experience a wake-up call, when really, it’s the Cowboys who need to get their business together.
As Deadspin pointed out, the week’s festivities for the Cowboys came to a head when Garrett held this incredibly bizarre press conference, in which he says “in the best interest of the Dallas Cowboys” 10 times in three minutes.
There are politicians who do not come off this gross while discussing, well, just about anything. In a ton of cases, getting to the top of the world of professional sports requires you to be something of a soulless robot, and yet Garrett comes off as the most soulless robot of them all while explaining why he cut someone who did nothing wrong.
Whitehead has been in some hot water with the team before, so it’s plausible that the team viewed this situation as more “the straw that broke the camel’s back” than a bombshell revelation or anything. Well, let me clarify -— Whitehead has missed a few team meetings and once got benched for that, which, considering what the Cowboys deem acceptable, should probably be a non-issue.
There are a few more plausible reasons for the Cowboys cutting him. They might have wanted to send a message (lol) to their players who get out of line (lol) by saying “we will not tolerate your bad behavior” or something (lol). They might view someone else —- like receiver Cole Beasley, running back Lance Dunbar, or 2017 fourth round draft pick Ryan Switzer —- as guys who can make an impact in the return game without the inconsistency issues (namely with drops) that have impacted Whitehead over his NFL career.
They may be mad that Whitehead decided to pursue the man who kidnapped his dog instead of reading over the playbook or something. That probably wasn’t it, but I had to mention that Whitehead’s dog was literally kidnapped and held for a ransom of $20,000 earlier this month. It’s been a weird month for Whitehead. I digress.
The thing is there’s nothing the Cowboys can do in this situation. No matter what, they are going to look terrible. Trying to bring Whitehead back would be them admitting wrongdoing, and it’s hard to imagine why Whitehead would, you know, accept their apology after they called him a liar. They can keep saying they did what’s in the best interest of the franchise, only every time they do it, they’ll get a little more egg on their face. They could just apologize publicly, but that won’t make up for the fact that they cut him, anyway.
The good news for Whitehead is his agent said he’s had three or four teams reach out to him about his client. Wherever he ends up going, it’s probably safe to assume that he’s champing at the bit for a chance to house a kickoff against his old team.
