OXNARD, Calif. — Dallas Cowboys offensive coordinator Klayton Adams said Wednesday that Terence Steele has been up and down in training camp, and that the two talked that morning about how to find consistency.
Steele is in his seventh season with the Dallas Cowboys and has started 90 games at right tackle. He arrived from Texas Tech as an undrafted free agent in 2020 and has started every game over the past three years.
Klayton Adams on Terence Steele’s Consistency
Adams said the staff is trying to create competition at every level of the roster, and that carving out a few reps off for a veteran inside that setup is difficult.
“I would say it’s been up and down. He and I had a good conversation about that this morning of how we continue to try to find consistency,” Adams said. “And he’s a guy that’s going into year seven, and he’s never going to ask for a day off, and he’s never going to ask for a break. And so we’re just searching for ways to help him and help him play at his best and most consistent.”
Cowboys coach Brian Schottenheimer said Tuesday that Steele has had a stretch of practices where he dropped his pads and got beaten around the edge. Adams was asked what goes into fixing that while the team moves in and out of pads this late in camp.
“Well, I think in today’s NFL, different than probably 10 or 12 years ago, there’s a lot of different medical things that guys are doing to try to make sure that their flexibility and their explosiveness and that they’re rested properly. I think we’ve run a great camp in terms of that and putting guys in position to do that,” Adams explained. “And we’re trying to create competition at every level and some of it is hard to get guys a few reps off.”
“That’s one of the things that we’re potentially looking into is how do we get him in year seven in a mode where he can be at his best all the time,” Adams continued. “What’s the right workload for that? So those are questions that in my mind I’m trying to answer.”
Dallas gave Steele a five-year, $86.8 million extension in 2023. The front office restructured that deal this offseason rather than release him, dropping his 2026 salary to the veteran minimum and converting the rest into guaranteed bonuses.
Nate Thomas and T.J. Bass in the Cowboys’ Swing Plan
Nate Thomas is taking right tackle reps in camp after competing for the left tackle job this spring. T.J. Bass has played mostly left guard and center in Dallas and is now working on the right side.
Adams said a first-round pick usually gets planted at one spot and left there, and that a swing player has to be handled differently.
“When you’re bringing someone in to potentially swing, you have to play them on both sides a fair amount. And so I think that there’s several different stages to it,” Adams said. “And I think this applies to a lot of different positions, not just the offensive line, but the stagger that goes into the right side and the left side needs to be worked a lot. When you start a guy as a swing player, I like to think of it as at least a week one side and then at least a week on the other side.”
“I don’t know if the science community will kill me if the muscle memory is not a thing, but that’s what we used to say when I was a kid,” Adams added. “But developing that and you’re doing something with your left hand that you’re used to doing with your right hand, those type of things. I think as a player gets more experience in his career, for example, I had a guy that was in year 12 in Arizona who was a swing player. I could throw him on both sides in the same series. And that was good to be able to do that for him. I wouldn’t want to do that with a young player, even though sometimes that happens.”
Thomas went 233rd overall in 2024 and spent his rookie year on injured reserve. He played all 17 games last season with 4 starts and 342 offensive snaps. Bass came to Dallas as an undrafted free agent out of Oregon in 2023 and has 10 starts in 48 career games, at both left and right guard.
Dallas plays at Arizona on Saturday at 9 p.m. CT on NFL Network.
