Cowboys' decision making with Dak Prescott is baffling | The Exempt List
Yahoo Sports NFL writer Charles McDonald is joined by The Ringer's Steven Ruiz to discuss the Dallas Cowboys' baffling decision making with Dak Prescott and why Jerry Jones needs to bear more responsibility for the Cowboys' lack of recent success. Hear the full conversation on “The Exempt List with Charles McDonald” - part of the “Zero Blitz” podcast - and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen.
Video Transcript
The Dallas Cowboys.
Very puzzling and off season, dude.
I just, I don't get it.
I, I don't get what Jerry's doing here.
Um And people have tried to explain it to me like, oh, you know, just you play out the season and then see what happens.
It's like, dude, that is the worst.
I feel like that's the worst possible way that you can handle this because right now I said, I've said a million times before.
It's one of the most baffling things of this entire off season to me, the Cowboys are letting Dak Prescott walked into the season with a $60 million cap hit on their roster, which just, it, it, it, it makes no sense.
It makes absolutely no sense.
And like, there's, there's two obvious ways to kind of handle a situation like this trade him or extend him.
Um And I feel like his value would be pretty high if I, if I went out back in March and I dangled Dak Prescott on the NFL trade market and like an earnest way to, to reset and rebuild the roster because for whatever reason, I don't want to do this anymore.
Um, you could probably get three first round picks for him.
Right.
And, and, you know, they're also not committed on extending him.
So you're kind of in a situation where the value that you've accumulated up to this point is just in flux.
Right?
Ok. Well, if doc has a super, like a super Nova season this year, what is he going to ask for, like 62 $63 million per year next year?
Which is what you want to avoid?
Would you sign to a contract like five years ago or the $40 million year one?
Uh, or if he tanks it, he plays terribly because they haven't been able to put pieces around him because of this cap pit number that's sitting there.
Then what do you do with the trademark?
You get diminished return on what you could have had this year.
I, I don't, I don't get what Jerry's doing at all and it, it, it kind of feels like he doesn't understand what he's doing either, especially playing hardball with CD Lamb while the Eagles get two wide receiver extension done, done in the, in the same off season.
It's, it's, it's just very, very strange to me.
I feel like we have to, we have to like relitigate Jerry jones' reputation as being like this, like shrewd hard, he's gonna play hardball businessman, like going back to even like the Zeke stuff he got, he kind of got played by Zeke, like Zeke held out and got his deal and got paid and then it was like, washed, like two years later, Dak, last time this happened, it was like, it played out the same exact way.
He, he tried to hold out on Dak.
He tried to play hardball, tried to make Dak prove it in a prove it season.
And then Dak did and then ended up making like 50 more million than he would have.
And I think the same thing is gonna happen here, but I agree with you.
I feel like it's either extend them or trade.
The one thing they're doing is the one thing that they can't afford to do, like literally can't afford to do 60 million a $60 million cap.
It is just insane.
And I think it's a simple question.
They have to ask themselves over the next, what four years, let's say you have to, you have to give them a four year contract over the next four years.
Are we going to find a quarterback better than Dak Prescott?
And how neither is, no, it's just realistically no, unless you get the first round of first overall pick and Caleb Williams comes out, it's not happening there.
There's also a lot of hubris here too, I think because, uh of quite frankly, they stumbled into two back to back franchise quarterbacks with investments that are like like 99th percentile outcomes, right?
You got Tony Romo as a UD FA then you come back 2016, uh, where this, this is the year before they could trade compensatory picks.
So you were still locked into that spot no matter what they tried to trade up for Pax and Lynch, they couldn't get it done.
So fourth round comp pick comes around, the NFL says you're still not allowed to trade him.
Ah, that's it.
We'll take a quarterback here.
I'll take Doc Prescott and then it works out in this manner.
So I feel like in Jerry's mind, Jerry probably thinks that he can get a quarterback anywhere even though he did try to trade up for Pack and Lynch in the year.
They drafted Dak Prescott and, and think about this, like, think about how much like, shit we talk about like the Packers and the Colts for not winning more when they kind of like inherited the same situation.
They go from Peyton Manning to Andrew Luck.
The, the Packers obviously go from far to Rogers to love and those teams only have three Super Bowls combined over the last three decades to show for it what the Cowboys don't have anything and they, like you said, they, they got even luckier, at least the Colts had to get the first overall pick to get their two guys.
The, the Packers had to use two first round picks to get their guys, these guys, like you said, 1/4 round pick in a UD FA who become, I would argue top five quarterbacks of their generation respectively and you can't get to the NFC championship like that falls on Jerry and Jerry.
Well, we can talk about Wade Phillips.
We could talk about Jason Garrett, we could talk about Mike mccarthy all we want, but who hired those guys and who sat around while they blew these, these rosters like Jerry's failure since the uh, Jimmy Johnson era has, has not been documented enough.
I think we need to relitigate his reputation.