Draft History: 1998

IRVING - Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, who amassed his fortune in the speculative oil and gas business, decided not to gamble with the eighth pick in Saturday's NFL draft.

So he bypassed troubled Marshall wide receiver Randy Moss and selected North Carolina's Greg Ellis, considered the draft's third-best defensive end.

Arizona picked Florida State defensive end Andre Wadsworth with the third pick, and St. Louis nabbed Nebraska's Grant Wistrom with the sixth pick.

That left the Cowboys with Ellis, a player draft experts think will be a solid NFL player.

"This is a safe pick," Jones said. "It could be considered a reach as to whether you should take him with the eighth pick and whether he's going to be a dominant pass rusher.

"I could have solved that problem by moving down seven or eight spots and pleasing my critics, but I couldn't do that. I lost my nerve."

In the second round, the Cowboys picked Michigan State offensive tackle Flozell Adams, who many projected as a first-round pick. He slid in the draft because of a sprained ankle, which hampered his performance last season and because he is partially deaf in his right ear.

But Ellis and Adams give the Cowboys a strong foundation in the draft which continues today, because coach Chan Gailey said the Cowboys needed to draft impact players with their first two picks.

Coach Chan Gailey said picking Ellis was an easy choice after Wadsworth and Wistrom were gone.

"We thought this was the very best person for our football team at this time," Gailey said. "The proof will come this year and the next year and the next year as this guy turns out to be a good player."

Ellis, 6-6 and 283 pounds, is the third defensive end the Cowboys have chosen with their first pick in the past five years. They hope Ellis has more success than the others.

Shante Carver, a first-round pick in 1994, was average at best, and the Cowboys have decided not to re-sign him. Kavika Pittman, a second-round pick in 1996, has one sack and no impact in two seasons.

But Jones said the Cowboys have already penciled Pittman and Ellis into the starting lineup next season along with tackles Chad Hennings and Leon Lett.

"I'm not surprised I was taken in the top 10 because I know Wadsworth and Wistrom and I thought our games were similar," Ellis said. "There's going to be some pressure because I'm the eighth pick, but you can't have it any other way."

Ellis can play both defensive end spots, but the Cowboys want him to replace left defensive end Tony Tolbert, a starter since 1991.

Tolbert, bothered by chronically bad knees, slipped from 12 to five sacks and from 85 tackles to 60 tackles in 1997.

Jones said the Cowboys discussed acquiring the third pick from Arizona the past two days, but the price was too high. The Cowboys offered to swap No. 1 picks this year in addition to giving the Cardinals their No. 2 pick this season and a first-round pick in 1999 for the rights to draft Wadsworth. Jones said the Cowboys also discussed swapping spots with New England, which had the 18th and 22nd picks in the first round.

But Jones said the Cowboys were never close to making a deal.

Besides, Gailey said he did some research that showed few defensive ends taken after the 10th pick have made an impact in the past 10 seasons. Several, however, taken before the 10th pick have been quality players.

Jones said the Cowboys decided they couldn't take a chance of losing Ellis by moving down.

"We didn't want to take the risk. We didn't have the stomach for the risk," Jones said. "It was going to really take something for us to move out of the top 10."

The Cowboys need Ellis, who had nine sacks as a senior and broke Lawrence Taylor's school record with 321/2 career sacks, to be an impact player.

Although the Cowboys finished second in the NFL in defense last season, they recorded only 38 sacks, which tied Chicago and St. Louis for 18th in the NFL.

They ranked last in the NFL with 19 forced turnovers and were the only team to have fewer than 10 interceptions.

Consistent pressure on the quarterback should lead to increases in all of those categories.

"This guy has tremendous upside to be better and better," defensive line coach Jim Bates said. "He hasn't tapped his ability level. He's going to make an excellent football player."