DeMarvion Overshown entered the NFL two years ago with the Dallas Cowboys wearing No. 13, but that was never the number he really wanted. After sporting No. 0 for the Texas Longhorns and building a brand around his "Agent Zero" moniker, it made sense for Overshown to take the same jersey number at the next level, especially after the league finally made the number available to players. However, Jerry Jones and the team didn't go for the idea at the time.
Safety Jayron Kearse almost wore the zero for Dallas when the league first changed the rules, but he also settled for another number in the end. Finally, on Aug. 9, the Cowboys announced the former Longhorn could change jerseys.
Now, the Dallas Cowboys will put their first ever No. 0 jersey on the field this season, but it took some extreme measures on Overshown's part to get it done. The middle linebacker went into details of how he made it happen on the "Cowboys Hour" with Brad Sham and Nicole Hutchison on Monday night.
"After the draft, they told me, 'Jerry's not giving out zero,'" Overshown told Sham and Hutchison. "So I come back the following year, and I ask again... it was still, like, 'No, that's nobody's number.' I was told that we got a 00, which is Rowdy, so, that's what I heard. After the 13 campaign, I was sold on it. But I tell people, the day I was supposed to go to the factory where they were going to do the jersey print out, I wanted to make sure."
After exhausting his official channels, Overshown decided to use his personal contacts at the last minute. Luckily for him, his personal contacts are rather close to the Cowboys ownership; in fact, they are part of Cowboys ownership.
"So I actually called up Paxton (Anderson), Jerry's grandson, played at Texas, we were locker buddies... I called him up and I said, 'Look, I'm fully invested in 13, this isn't me coming at y'all like, I need zero because I balled out,'" Overshown continued. "Look, at this point I felt like if I earned it, I earned it. That was the story I ran with in my head that I needed to earn it. I got to go make plays to get it. I don't know if that was true but that's what I told myself."
That fateful call led to Anderson making Overshown's case to his mom, Charlotte Jones Anderson, who serves as the Cowboys' Executive VP and Chief Brand Officer. Two hours later, Anderson called his former teammate back to give him the good news.
The former third-round pick in 2023 won't be taking the field with the Cowboys when they open the season against the Philadelphia Eagles as he continues his ACL surgery rehab, but when he finally does, he'll be dressed for success. He'll start the season on the PUP list with sights set on a Week 5 return.
"It's just like when Superman put on his cape, when I put that No. 0 on, it's really Agent 0 out there," Overshown told reporters last month.
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