FRISCO, Texas -- Dee Winters was busy when his phone rang on April 24, Day 2 of the NFL draft. He was moving into a new house in Arlington, Texas, rearranging boxes and figuring out what goes where.
On the other end of the line was Dallas Cowboys executive vice president Stephen Jones, who told Winters he was being traded to the Cowboys from the San Francisco 49ers.
The linebacker will not have to travel far to AT&T Stadium for games, and the ride to The Star in Frisco, Texas, won’t be too taxing either, depending on the time of day.
“So, I guess everything worked out perfectly,” said Winters, a linebacker.
The bad news? Winters had just shipped his truck to California for the start of the 49ers’ offseason program. Now it has to be shipped back to Texas.
And that’s OK with Winters, who played collegiately at TCU.
“Definitely didn’t have any plans on being traded, but everything happens for a reason,” he said, “and I’m excited that I’m back home and I get to play for the Dallas Cowboys.”
Winters figures to play a prominent role in the Cowboys’ defense. Unable to lure one of the top free agent linebackers (e.g., Quay Walker, Nakobe Dean, Devin Lloyd) and not in position to take a linebacker in the draft without a second-round pick (after taking safety Caleb Downs and edge rusher Malachi Lawrence in Round 1), the Cowboys turned to the trade market.
They gave up a fifth-round pick for Winters, who started every game in San Francisco last season and was credited with 101 tackles. In all, he has made 27 career starts, which is more than the combined total (23) of the other veteran off-ball linebackers on the roster before the trade -- DeMarvion Overshown, Shemar James and Justin Barron.
“Just going through the process and looking at him coming out of TCU, he’s athletic,” vice president of player personnel Will McClay said. “He’s fast. He liked football and could go play in space. Now you see him play at the NFL level and you see those things grow and him get better at those. So, we followed him all throughout because he had traits that we liked, and then the character part and the things about loving football was there. So, we keep our eye on it.”
But Winters, who played in a 4-3 defensive system in San Francisco, will have to learn a new scheme, just like his new Cowboys teammates, as defensive coordinator Christian Parker changes Dallas to 3-4 system. So far in his early discussions with Parker, Winters does not believe the transition will be difficult.
“He wants to get me in space,” Winters said. “He feels like one of my assets is me being in space, and being able to make tackles in space, and just run and hit with physicality and speed that I bring to the game. I think him and I both are excited to see what that looks like and go from there.”
Overshown is likely to play weakside linebacker (Will), which means Winters would play middle linebacker (Mike), but he said Parker said there will be a rotation of sorts during the offseason and camp so everybody has some familiarity at the position.
Winters could be asked to be the “green dot,” the player whose helmet receives the defensive playcalls from Parker. Winters did not serve in that role in San Francisco, but he said he did have the green dot for some practices.
“I feel like I do a pretty good job of communicating at the Will linebacker position. But me being a Mike linebacker, you have to be able to run the defense and make the calls,” Winters said. “I think that takes a lot of film study, and it’s kind of a different aspect to the game that not a lot of other guys do. So I think just taking the film room extremely serious and just running it.”
For most of three years in San Francisco, he watched All-Pro Fred Warner handle that role.
The Cowboys will not ask Winters to be Warner, but he wants to show what he learned from Warner.
“Just day-to-day life as being a linebacker. How to watch film, how to come to work every day and attention to detail that he brought, I think that’s what really makes him the best,” Winters said. “He does it at a high level. As far as communication standpoint, how he runs the defense, and just knowing what offenses are going to do. Like he’s a nerd at heart when it comes to film. So just being able to soak all that information in while being with him for three years was amazing. Now I’m excited to start my new venture.”
A new venture in a new house, but not a foreign place. Winters visited The Star prior to the 2023 draft and was actually with Overshown at the time. He was teammates at TCU with Dallas’ 2024 first-rounder Tyler Guyton before the left tackle transferred to Oklahoma. His grandparents were Cowboys fans, so he grew up watching every game. His best friends were Cowboys fans, too.
“They were pretty sad when I got drafted by the Niners because they felt like they couldn’t wear 49ers gear,” Winters said, “but now I’m back in blue and they’re really excited. It all worked out.”
