Dallas Cowboys three-time Pro Bowl quarterback Dak Prescott said he didn't "need" a contract extension before the team's Week 1 matchup at the Cleveland Browns, but that clearly was the case.
Team owner and general manager Jerry Jones met the deadline with the 2023 NFL passing touchdowns leader (36) by signing Prescott to a four-year, $240 million extension Sunday morning, which made the Cowboys passer the highest-paid player in the NFL with a $60 million average per year salary. The previous high was $55 million APY. Prescott also broke NFL records with the highest signing bonus ever ($80 million) and the most guaranteed money ever ($231 million).
Despite the massive financial commitment, Jones believes the contract was worth it because it locks in a quarterback the team will go to war for every single week. Jones turns 82 years old on Oct. 13, so he hopes Prescott will be the Cowboys quarterback for the rest of life, which he believes will last past the expiration of the latest deal in the 2029 offseason.
"The figure is right, and the figure is... what it means is a big commitment to next five years, to our future if you will. There's a lot of me that thinks I hope Dak is our quarterback for the rest of my time, so that's not just limited to the terms of this contract either," Jones said with a wink pregame in Cleveland, via Yahoo Sports. "I got a lot of confidence in him. He's got a lot of, brings so much to the table. He's a player that the team follows. That's big. Roger Staubach told me when I asked him, 'Drop back or move around quarterback?' He said, 'I don't know about any of that. Have someone that the team will follow.'"
Dallas Pro Bowl left guard Tyler Smith validated Jones' assessment about Prescott's leadership on Thursday.
"That's my brother," Smith said Thursday when asked about Prescott. "A lot of people have a lot of opinions about people and what they think or how things are, but one thing I know is a reality and a fact is we're in here grinding every day. This man leaves the building last almost every day, whether people know it or not." Just seeing the work he puts in on the field, the way he encourages us, the way he uplifts us, it's something huge. I got his back, I know he has mine."
Cowboys COO Stephen Jones, the Dallas executive in the hands-on role in Prescott's negotiations -- something Prescott revealed on Thursday -- acknowledged high financial commitment while also agreeing with his father that they both wanted Prescott to lead their football team. The duo now has both Prescott and 2023 NFL receptions leader CeeDee Lamb (four years, $136 million) locked down for the next five years after extending both this offseason.
"Good to get it in the rearview mirror," Stephen Jones said, via Yahoo Sports. "It's something we both wanted, have Dak for the long term. That was our goal: to get CeeDee done and then to get Dak done."
"You always want less," Stephen Jones continued to say when asked about Prescott's $60 million average per year salary. "But at the end of the day, that was the number it took, and we want Dak to lead this football team."
Jerry Jones feels Prescott's contract won't prevent the team from being competitive in the years to come. It's a fair assessment given that the league's salary cap continues to rise each year thanks to the NFL's 11-year, $111 billion media rights deal. The Cowboys are projected to have $36.8 million in cap space in 2025 and $180.5 million in 2026.
"It's going to always be a test and a measurement when it comes planning ahead. That's a big thing. We sit on eroding sand and things change every year. My assessment with where we're going to be going in the future is we're going to be handle this," Jerry Jones said, per ESPN. "We're going to be able to get players around him that give us a chance to compete for the Super Bowl. He was best chance of getting one."
Micah Parsons up next?
Now that the Cowboys have taken care of Lamb and Prescott, three-time All-Pro edge rusher Micah Parsons is next in line. The 25-year-old had the best season of his career in Year 3 last season: he totaled a career-high 14.0 sacks and the league in numerous pass rush metrics. Parsons paced the NFL in quarterback pressures (103), quarterback pressure rate (21.8%) and pass-rush win rate (35.3%) -- which is when a defender beats his block in less than 2.5 seconds. Those numbers are impressive on their own merit. When adding in that Parsons was double-teamed on 35% of his pass rush plays in 2023, the most in the league among edge players, per the NFL's Next Gen Stats, it appears to be a no-brainer to extend him within the next 12 months.
"Any player you sign does have an impact. The real questions is the rest of the story, which is how do things evolve? Where are we when that time comes?" Jerry Jones said, per Yahoo Sports. "You have to have a plan, and believe in me I'm thinking ahead. I always have when it comes to the Cowboys. Like I said, $12 million cash was what I had when I bought the Cowboys. So, you say 'well that's a lot of money.' That was a lot of money to me probably then than the kind of money we're talking to now, at that particular time to me. The big thing is it's all relevant. This was the thing to do."
To Jones' point, not much else matters in the NFL if you don't have a quarterback. Having Prescott locked down for the next five seasons, including 2024, will allow Dallas to shape their roster around their big three players with certainty and be more aggressive with player acquisition now that they have some of the team's biggest salaries officially locked in.
"This was the thing to do for what we're here for and that is to win a championship," Jerry Jones continued to say, per ESPN. "I know our fans know that. I'm surprised that anyone would think that anything short of, they might disagree with the decision, but anything short of a commitment is just not the case with me. I gave everything I ever had or hoped to have to get a chance to be a part of the Cowboys. And it's beyond my fondest dreams where we stand today."
