Dallas Cowboys Passed on Travis Kelce in 2013 Draft Due to Controversial “Red Flags”

According to the Kelce brothers’ New Heights Podcast, the Dallas Cowboys and owner Jerry Jones passed on Kansas

City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce at the 2013 NFL Draft due to “red flags” they observed in him.

The Cowboys passed on Kelce because he was suspended for a year in 2010 after testing positive for marijuana at the

University of Cincinnati.

The Dallas Cowboys ignored this warning flag only a few years later.

Despite losing Travis Kelce to the Kansas City Chiefs in 2013 due to a “red flag” of marijuana use, the Dallas Cowboys

ignored the same “red flag” in the 2015 selection by selecting defensive end Randy Gregory from the Nebraska

Cornhuskers.

While Gregory was not suspended for marijuana usage during his time at Nebraska, which could indicate that the

Cowboys and company were unaware of his habits, he quickly became one of the faces of marijuana use in the NFL

owing to the numerous drug tests he failed.

In a piece published by The Athletic, Gregory claimed to have failed about 100 NFL drug tests. Gregory was

suspended for 52 of the 96 games he had played in the league as of 2021. Gregory stated in the report that owner

Jerry Jones had his back throughout it all.

“He’s had my back through all of this,” Gregory says. “Whenever I felt like my career was going to end, I’d get a call

from Jerry, and he’d come at me in the gentlest way possible, saying, ‘It’s all right. Do everything is necessary to

ensure your safety. That is all I care about right now. I don’t care about football.’ It’s good to be regarded like way,

because I can assure you that no other club would have done what Jerry and (Cowboys CEO) Stephen Jones did.

The Dallas Cowboys weren’t the only ones that passed on Kansas City Chiefs tight end. Travis Kelce

Kelce was not very well-known coming out of Cincinnati, where he only played one season. He has 722 receiving

yards and eight touchdowns in 2012. Prior to it, he had his greatest season, with 150 receiving yards and two

touchdowns.

Instead of Kelce, Dallas selected San Diego State tight end Gavin Escobar in the middle of the second round. Escobar

had three years of consistent productivity, finishing the 2011 season with 780 receiving yards and seven touchdowns,

quite similar to Kelce.

The Cowboys’ safe decision did not pay off, as Kelce established himself as one of the finest tight ends in NFL history

while with the Kansas City Chiefs.

Kelce has three Super Bowl rings from the Kansas City Chiefs and is the fastest tight end to achieve 11,000 yards

receiving. He is on track to surpass another Kansas City Chiefs legend, Tony Gonzales.

Other tight ends selected before Kelce in the 2013 NFL draft were:

Zach Ertz is the lone tight end that is still in the NFL.

Get more related news 9n:https://sportviewers.com