Julio Jones’ days with the Atlanta Falcons are finished. And wherever he plays next, it won’t be for the Dallas Cowboys.
That’s according to the stud wide receiver himself.
“Oh man, no, I’m outta there, man,” Jones, 32, told Shannon Sharpe of the Falcons on FS1’s “Undisputed” Monday morning, when asked if he’d prefer to go to Dallas or stay in Atlanta.
Sharpe, who had dialed Jones on his personal cell phone live on air, followed up by asking where Jones would like to play.
“Right now I’m just — I wanna win,” Jones said.
Sharpe joked: “Well, don’t go to Dallas. You ain’t winnin’ in Dallas, Julio.”
Jones responded: “Man, listen, come on, man: you already know I know.”
Jones was being so unusually candid that, as Sharpe laughed, host Jenny Taft jumped in and said: “Can you remind him we’re on television right now?”
The Jones-Cowboys rumors stemmed from a photo posted Saturday by NFL fan Mike Starkey of Jones in the Dallas area wearing a Cowboys Nike sweatshirt.
“Met Julio Jones in Dallas, wearing a Cowboys jersey…wouldn’t be mad!” Starkey wrote on the viral tweet.
Jones doesn’t have a no-trade clause, so he can’t technically control where he’s traded. But he assured he won’t be a Cowboy.
“Listen, you know how people are with all that going on with the picture,” Jones told Sharpe. “Man, I ain’t never been on that, you know what I’m sayin?”
Just before they hung up, Sharpe said they were talking on television.
“Julio, I’ll talk to you later,” Sharpe said. “Thanks for calling me back. We on air, but I appreciate you calling me, dog.”
Jones concluded: “I ain’t goin to Dallas, man. I ain’t never thought about going to Dallas.”
Jones is expected to be traded on or after June 1. On that date, Atlanta can spread Jones’ heavy salary cap hit between both 2021 and 2022 instead of eating it all this year.
The Falcons’ cap crunch and organizational turnover are the primary contributing factors to Jones’ imminent departure.
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Rumors and reports have named the Patriots and 49ers among potential suitors. San Francisco head coach Kyle Shanahan was Jones’ former offensive coordinator in Atlanta.
The L.A. Rams are short on cap space, but if they can find a way to fit Jones, they would make a ton of sense with new QB Matthew Stafford operating Sean McVay’s offense.
The Rams are all in on trying to become the second Super Bowl host ever to win the big game in its own building. The Buccaneers made history by doing that in Tampa this past February.
Jones is due to count $23 million, $19.2 million and $19.2 million respectively on the remainder of his contract through 2023. But while $15.3 million of his 2021 salary is guaranteed, only $2 million is guaranteed in 2022, and none is guaranteed in the final year.
The Falcons want at least a second-round pick in a trade for Jones, according to multiple reports, including SI.com and CBS Sports.