FRISCO, Texas -- What do you remember about Jaydon Blue's rookie season with the Dallas Cowboys?
At the top of the list is probably how the 2025 fifth-round running back got blisters from his custom cleats that featured Louis Vuitton print on them at a practice that left coach Brian Schottenheimer scratching his head.
"Halfway through practice I saw him laying there, I was like, 'What the hell happened to Blue?'" Schottenheimer said in October. "'Oh, coach, I'm fine. I have blisters.' I was like, 'Oh, shocker. Look at the cool shoes you got.' That's part of what you deal with in young players. And quickly he changed his cleats, and it's amazing the blisters weren't as bad."'
With Miles Sanders out with a knee injury in Week 5, Blue made his debut against the New York Jets after being inactive the first four games of the season. He had four carries for seven yards in the first of four straight games in which he was active.
He then was a healthy scratch for the next eight games. He lost the chance to be Javonte Williams' primary backup to Malik Davis, whom the Cowboys had cut in the spring and brought back later in training camp.
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Davis finished as the Cowboys' second-leading rusher (250 yards) behind Williams (1,201) and had a 100-yard game in Week 17, when Williams was out with a shoulder injury.
Blue finished the season with 129 yards and a touchdown on 38 carries. Even when things looked good, there was a strangeness. Blue started the final game of the season and finished with 64 yards on 16 carries against the New York Giants, but he had 76 yards rushing in the first half. He lost 12 yards on his five second-half carries, which was more a product of a stalled offense when Dak Prescott was taken out of the game.
When the season ended, Schottenheimer and Blue had what the coach called a "candid conversation."
"We kind of put it all out there, put all the cards on the table," Schottenheimer said. "He didn't like being inactive, and I was very honest with my opinion of why he wasn't active. So we had some really great conversations. He took that, he ingested it, took it in and he's come back with a great look on his face and a great work ethic."