The Cowboys have restructured quarterback Dak Prescott‘s contract to create roughly $15MM in cap space, per a club announcement. Meanwhile, they’ve also reworked the contract of guard Zack Martin to free up an extra ~$7MM in room. Between the two moves, the Cowboys have an additional $22MM to work with in advance of free agency. 
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This appears to be a simple restructuring — one that converts 2022 base salary into a signing bonus. Prescott has done this before, agreeing to tweak his contract last year to give Dallas an extra $5MM in space.
Injuries limited Prescott to just five games in 2020, but he managed to play in 16 games last year. He finished the year with an 11-5 record in his starts with 4,449 yards and 37 touchdowns against ten interceptions. That marked the best TD% of his career to date (6.2). Statistically, that’s what the Cowboys were hoping for when they inked him to a four-year, $160MM extension in March of ’21. His contract — which made him the league’s second-ever $40MM/year player — remains largely the same after today’s adjustment.
Martin, a seven-time Pro Bowler, missed six regular season games in 2020 with a calf injury. In 2021, he bounced back strong with 16 starts and yet another All-Pro nod.
All that chatter about contracts, overpaying players, JJ doesn’t know S**t and subtraction by subtraction nonsense the Cowboys swipe a pen and clear themselves under the cap. Dallas is house cleaning just like any other team that spends yo the limit.
The bill will eventually come due, see current Falcons for proof. But I do agree that when a team is in compete mode like Dallas, cap hell is pretty easy to escape from. Being able to clear 20+ mil without penalty from cutting Cooper is a blessing though
They didn’t kick the van. This was a simple flip of a switch. It was built into his contract. Read the article on SI published yesterday.
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Just read it and your right. Seems too good to be true though. Maybe paying Dak 40 mil is the catch though lol
As a Cowboys fan it’s frustrating knowing as long as Prescott is qb they’ll never win a Super Bowl. It’s even more frustrating knowing Jerry and his pack of clowns don’t understand this.
This comment alone proves you aren’t a Cowboys fan. What do you suggest? Go and get Mahomes? Aaron Rodgers? Draft an unproven young QB? We’ve tried all that, we haven’t had that type of QB since Aikman. We’re lucky our 4th round QB dart throw was as good as he is, shout-out to Mcclay & his staff. Dak isn’t the issue, it’s systemic. There’s no pressure on the GM to win now b/c his daddy running the show. Prescott has all of the intangibles you want in a leader/QB with numbers consistently in the Top-10 & Top-5 when healthy. Respectfully.
He should be putting up those numbers with the amount of offensive weapons he has had. While I agree the ROI for the 4th is great, but his cap number is going to make it hard to put guys around him. Early on he had an elite oline and run game to lean on, and recently he has had pretty darn good receiving options. Romo was UDFA and he put up similar numbers, and hell even Cooper Rush put up 300+ passing yards in his lone start this year (not saying you could expect that from him every week, but it is attainable from a decent lower level QB that won’t wreck your cap). We will now get to see how great Dak is/isn’t with an oline that is declining and with the offensive weapons also most likely getting downgraded this upcoming season.
Also, having pressure on a GM doesn’t do much anyways in this case. Since the guy running the show previously wasn’t making a ton of great moves either and now still oversees them. So kind of a moot point.
I’ve been a Cowboys fan since the 60’s. During my lifetime the Cowboys have spent a first round draft pick for a quarterback once (Aikman). They also drafted another clear high first round talent in Staubach who they nabbed late in the draft due to his Naval commitment.
These two thoroughbreds led the Cowboys to their only 5 championships. I’ve seen ALL the rest, including White, Romo, Hogeboom, Carter, bla bla bla. Zero championships. Until the Cowboys recognize that you win in the NFL with elite talent at the qb position they’ll continue being knocked out early or miss the playoffs altogether.
I understand it’s not simple landing premiere talent but it’s impossible if you don’t even try. It’s been 32 years since they’ve drafted a first round qb. THIRTY TWO YEARS! It’s tough to win the derby riding a mule.
They should start trading players…