The Dallas Cowboys-Denver Broncos collusion investigation is reportedly going to involve a big bit of evidence that comes from Dez Bryant, one of the players currently involved in contentious negotiations.
Bryant and Cowboys COO Stephen Jones are already at odds over their protracted contract talks, but they may soon be at odds over the NFLPAs collusion investigation as well as Mike Florio of ProFootballTalk reports that the possible collusion charges actually stem from a direct conversation between Bryant and Jones.
"Per a source with knowledge of the situation, Jones explained to Bryant that the Calvin Johnson contract, which represents the current peak of the receiver market, has no relevance to other receivers because it was driven by the pre-rookie wage scale deal that Johnson signed when he was drafted by the Lions in 2007," writes Florio. "And then Jones told Dez, per the source, that Jones talked to Broncos GM John Elway about the situation."
As Florio points out, because the Broncos and Elway have their own franchise tagged wide receiver in Demaryius Thomas, this admission of communication on the matter between Jones and Elway would likely constitute evidence of collusion.
Of course, the Cowboys and Jones are likely to deny that any such conversation took place - just as Jones denied that Bryant had indicated to the team that he wouldn't be showing up for training camp, the preseason and even regular season games without a long-term contract by the Wednesday deadline for franchise tagged players to sign new deals, only for Bryant to then take to Twitter to triple-down on his threat.
Likewise, the Broncos and Elway are probably going to do their best to distance themselves from any of this collusion talk as quickly and cleanly as possible.
Still, it doesn't seem to be going away anytime soon, especially considering the players have likely been champing at the bit for years for a chance at skewering the owners for collusion practices that are probably about as rampant and ubiquitous as concussions during a given NFL season.