LONDON – The Cowboys won't be part of the NFL's International Series in 2015, but team owner/general manager Jerry Jones sounded confident his team will be back in London at some point.
Next year's London games were announced on Thursday, with the Miami Dolphins, New York Jets, Buffalo Bills, Jacksonville Jaguars, Kansas City Chiefs and Detroit Lions announced as the participants. Jones couldn't say when the Cowboys would pop back up in that conversation, but he didn't mince words when asked if they would.
"Yes. And I wouldn't dare elaborate under when, what, how, but again, this is attractive to our franchise," Jones said Thursday. "This is attractive to me. I like the idea. I like for our players to have these experiences."
The Cowboys have been in London since Tuesday morning, and they'll stay until Monday morning following Sunday night's game against Jacksonville.
It will be interesting to see how another trip develops, however, as the NFL seeks an increased presence in this overseas market. Jones has said in the past that he would not sacrifice the benefits and revenues of a home game to make the trip to London – they are currently visiting as the away team against the "home" Jaguars.
That said, recent reports have indicated that the NFL may require future Super Bowl host sites to play a home game in London in order to win a bid for the league's championship game.
"Frankly, I understand that it's been proposed, but I haven't seen anything that says in order to make a bid for a Super Bowl that you have to give up a home game," Jones said. "That may be a consideration, but I haven't seen it."
As Jones has said before, requests made for a Super Bowl bid don't necessarily have to be followed in order to secure the vote. The NFL has already awarded the game for the next four seasons – to Phoenix, San Francisco, Houston and Minneapolis – giving the Cowboys time to plan a future bid.
"You usually see suggested criteria, and they will point out to the owners that you didn't adhere to that criteria, but they could still put your city up for a vote," Jones said.
In the meantime the Cowboys will become the latest franchise to help the league determine the viability of an overseas team. Jones mentioned the experimenting done during last month's Atlanta-Detroit game at Wembley Stadium, to determine the practicality of playing day games in London.
Perhaps when the Cowboys do return to the United Kingdom, it will be to face a local team.
"On a personal basis and speaking for the Dallas Cowboys we very much would like to have a team in London," Jones said. "It has cache. It has an air about it of international competition I think that London is probably one of two or three cities outside of the United States that really does have all of the criteria that I would look at for having an NFL team."
