Jason Garrett believes Greg Hardy can 'become the right kind of guy' for Cowboys

The Dallas Cowboys have been the subject of criticism for signing Greg Hardy, but team officials remain steadfast in their defense of the move.

Cowboys head coach Jason Garrett spoke to reporters Wednesday and stated the team did their due diligence on Hardy.

"We spent a lot of time doing our due diligence on who he is as a person," Garrett said. "We brought him in and spent a couple days with him, so we felt like understanding who he is as a person was a critical piece to this, evaluating who he is a player was a critical piece to it, the structure of the contract was critical to it. At the end of the day, if we didn't believe he could become the right kind of guy for our football team, we wouldn't have signed him."

Hardy's debut with the Cowboys could be delayed as the pass rusher is awaiting league discipline after he was arrested and charged with making threats and assaulting his ex-girlfriend Nicole Holder. Charges were dropped on Feb. 9 after Holder would no longer cooperate with the prosecution.

"At the end of it, we decided we could bring him in under the right circumstances - the conditions of the contract were important. No guaranteed money, earn it every step of the way. At any point, if we don't feel like you're doing what we want you to do as a player and as a person, we can move on from you without any salary-cap consequence, all those things are very important to us," Garrett said.

Garrett made sure to note it'll be on the Cowboys to hold Hardy accountable for future actions.

"It's our job to bring the best out in all these guys, as players and as people. So I think everyone understands we're trying to build the right kind of football team with the talent level, with also who they are. It's our job to create the environment, and it's the player's job to respond, and it's our job to hold the player accountable."

Cowboys owner Jerry Jones spoke to Pro Football Talk on Wednesday night and said Hardy could have potentially received a contract close to Ndamukong Suh's if not for the incident.

"He’s paid a terrific price," Jones said. "Had he not had this incident his contract would be one like Ndamukong Suh, possibly, but he doesn’t have that. So he’s got more to come because the league is going to rule on if he has suspensions this year. All of that is all incorporated in that agreement and the bottom line is we hope and feel that he won’t do that, go down this road again."