It isn’t a guarantee the Dallas Cowboys sign quarterback Dak Prescott to a contract extension.
“We don’t need to, but we can if everybody wants to solve it,” the team owner said, per Nick Harris of the team’s official website. “You can get in and get on the same page and see if you can come to an agreement. If you can’t, what we have in place works. And so obviously, if you do it one way, you’ll be working through some of the other areas on the team in a different way, but you can’t really plan on that until you see when you’re there.”
Charean Williams of Pro Football Talk noted an extension has been “anticipated” this offseason since the quarterback is only under contract for the upcoming season and represents a $59.4 million salary cap hit for the team for 2024 if nothing is done.
Yet ESPN’s Dan Graziano said he is “not as convinced as a lot of people seem to be that a Dak Prescott extension in Dallas is a sure thing” even though such a move is “the best way to reduce” his “massive” cap number.
Graziano explained “Prescott has a large amount of leverage here, too” given his no-tag clause in his deal that removes the possibility of a franchise tag. What’s more, even a relatively simple restructuring of the deal that would convert his 2024 salary into a signing bonus would lead to a 2025 cap charge of approximately $55 million.
Jones also said he doesn’t “fear” the possibility of the quarterback signing elsewhere next offseason without a contract extension.
“Every player you got has some time when his contract is up,” he said. “You would walk around with the shakes if you feared it. You can’t because they all come up. They all can get hurt. They all can lose some talent, so all of that is not fear.”
The 2023 campaign was an important one for Prescott after he led the league with 15 interceptions in 2022 despite missing five games, and he responded by completing 69.5 percent of his passes for 4,516 yards, a league-best 36 touchdowns and nine interceptions while leading Dallas to an NFC East crown.
There are still concerns about the lack of playoff success for a team that hasn’t been past the Divisional Round since the 1995 campaign, but it was still a performance that figured to lead to a contract extension for the 30-year-old.
But Jones isn’t willing to guarantee that at this point.
