Jerry Jones Once Offered LeBron James A Football Contract To Be A Cowboy

We all suspect how good LeBron James would have been at football. He’s the most athletic person to ever walk the earth, period. There have been a number of professional athletes who played multiple sports at a high level—Bo Jackson, Deion Sanders, Jim Brown, and Charlie Ward all come to mind. But Bo Jackson and Jim Brown were 6’1” and 6’2”, respectively. LeBron is 6’8” with a 40-inch vertical. You stack your offensive line and play that game 500 with him on every play. Just wait until he’s down in the endzone and have him rise up like some shaving 8th grader who’s been held back ten years in a row.

Turns out, it may have been closer to a reality than we thought. Bron went on Paul Rivera’s show with his business manager, Maverick Carter, and a massive glass of wine. They talked about how, during the 2011 lockout, LeBron ran through some football workouts. Carter also revealed that Jerry Jones gave LeBron a “contract,” which LeBron has framed somewhere. Now, we don’t know much beyond that. It’s possible Jerry wrote that thing in crayon, on construction paper, and that LeBron used a fridge magnet to pin it up. But it is fun to imagine LeBron as a Cowboy.

It also enforces my theory that endurance athletes aren’t as athletic as ball/puck athletes. I’d even throw frisbee athletes in there. You think Lance Armstrong, in his prime, could hop off his bike one day and play slot receiver in the NFL? Imagine James Harrison or Troy Polamalu teeing him up over the middle. Steroids or not, Lance doesn’t walk again. That’s a fact. Their helmet hitting his chest cavity would sound like your dad breaking kindling into smaller pieces for a campfire. Splintering comes to mind.

LeBron in the NFL will always be a fun daydream. But I guess we’ll have to settle for him being the greatest basketball player of all time.