Dallas Cowboys trade for Matt Cassel to backup Brandon Weeden

Tony Romo may be out for the next two months or so with a broken collarbone, but Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones feels good about Brandon Weeden taking over as starting quarterback.

How good? Real good.

“This quarterback Weeden can drive the ball down field,” Jones said during a radio interview on Tuesday morning. “He’s a thing of beauty on throwing a football. His passing motion and his arm, frankly, you won’t see a more gifted passer, power, accuracy, the entire aspect of it. If he can basically prepare, be the starting quarterback, come in and execute and keep his head right, then I feel good about Weeden.”

Wow. A thing of beauty, eh? This is the same Brandon Weeden who went 5-15 and completed just 55% of his passes as a starter in Cleveland before spending the last two seasons as Romo’s backup, isn’t it?

Actually, Jones said, it’s not.

“Certainly we think Weeden has really progressed,” Jones said. “As [quarterback coach] Wade Wilson said, he’s just not the same guy that we had last year. He’s progressed that much. He said that before we had this issue with Tony. I think we all feel good about what we got.”

Still, the Cowboys went out and acquired quarterback Matt Cassel from the Buffalo Bills for a 2017 fifth-round pick, according to NFL.com. The Cowboys will also receive the Bills’ seventh-round pick from the same draft.