We have written a great deal about the Cowboys top extension candidates — Dak Prescott, Ezekiel Elliott, Amari Cooper, and Byron Jones — this offseason. It does not appear that the club is particularly close to striking a long-term deal with any of those players, and Calvin Watkins of the Dallas Morning News reports today that there has been no progress between the Cowboys and Jones (Twitter link).
Dallas made Jones the No. 27 overall pick of the 2015 draft, and though he spent most of his first three years in the league as a safety, he converted to cornerback full-time last season, and it was a highly-successful transition. Jones was one of Pro Football Focus’ best-graded boundary defenders in 2018 en route to a Second Team All-Pro nod, and he has positioned himself nicely for a big payday.
Jones is due roughly $6.2MM in 2019 under the fifth-year option of his rookie contract, but a new deal would give him a considerable raise. The Dolphins made Xavien Howard the highest-paid CB in league history several months ago after signing him to a five-year, $76.5MM extension ($46MM guaranteed), and Jones will be shooting for a similar payout.
Given all of the big-money negotiations that the Cowboys are engaged in, it’s not surprising that they haven’t made much progress with Jones. But if they don’t get something soon, Jones may price himself out of the team’s range.
Pay the man
This guy is an athletic freak. He will only get better. Shame on the Cowboys for using him at safety for years when he clearly was a corner.
They were desperate for a safety.
The Cowboys do not have enough money to pay all these young stars. Looks like it’s time to take a page out of the Patriots book: make the offers and then trade away those who aren’t interested in wearing the Stetson at a discount price. Clearly the Cowboys draft process is working so an expensive extension for Elliott or a cornerback doesn’t sound like a great idea.
QB’s have a long lifespan and good ones get better with time so offering Prescott a big package makes sense. Offensive linemen also play a long time. Linebackers, defensive backs, running backs all have a relatively short shelf life. By the time a team extends them on a long guaranteed contract, a team is paying way over the margin for reduced performance from the third year of the extension.
There’s always a loser team like the NY Jets to pick up soon to fade big names. Trade ’em while you can.
High quality defensive line and wide receivers can play for a long time in some cases and in other cases, have short careers. These positions are on a case by case basis. Linebackers had a longer productive career when the NFL was more a run league. As pass coverage is huge now even for linebackers the same issue of quickness and speed affects their careers. Hence top graded inside linebackers Zach Brown and Mason Foster were both released in this off-season by the Redskins. The Redskins couldn’t even find trade partners for these relatively affordable stalwarts. The NFL is truly a young man’s league now outside of QB, offensive line, tight end and elite receivers.