The Cowboys have not had any “real” contract talks with Dak Prescott this offseason, the quarterback said last week. Prescott wants to remain with the Cowboys, and the Cowboys want Prescott to remain their quarterback.
Yet, Prescott conceded last week there is no guarantee he is in Dallas beyond this season.
He is scheduled for free agency in 2025, and he has a no-tag clause in his contract.
“We want Dak Prescott,” Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said Tuesday, via Jon Machota of TheAthletic.com. “That’s that. . . . I give Mike [McCarthy] a lot of credit for [Prescott’s improvement last season]. That improvement demonstrated to me there’s more as far as ultimately winning what we’re trying to do here. The question nails it for me. We want Dak. We think that there’s room for growth. … If you are a team that has a lot of cap room, and then you have a quarterback for a little while that is well underneath in his rookie contract — San Francisco last year, us with Dak early after we had [Tony] Romo — boy, we had a lot of credit card use there on Romo. Dak came along, so we didn’t have to have it so we were able to absorb that money and still keep Tyron [Smith] around him. So Dak has enjoyed, in his career that we’re proud of, some of the best supporting casts that you could put around him.
“To move forward, we will have to diminish that. That’s a fact. That’s the rules. That’s our challenge and to make it work out. Dak as the quarterback Cowboys, I don’t even have a blink on that one.”
Prescott is counting $55.4 million against the salary cap this season.
He said last week that becoming the highest-paid quarterback is not “necessarily” his goal, and he seems in no hurry for an extension. Why would he be? Prescott will get his money from somebody.
The Cowboys could be waiting to see if Prescott, in his ninth season as their starter, can get them beyond the divisional round. They still haven’t been to an NFC Championship Game since 1995.
The Cowboys also haven’t moved on extensions for receiver CeeDee Lamb or edge rusher Micah Parsons yet either.
“You may be working on [contracts] and not moving anything but your eyebrows,” Jones said. “Who in the world would think that we’re not working on it? I work on it. It pops up at 2 in the morning sometimes. What you’re actually questioning is why don’t you have something done and negotiated and put in the drawer? Well, we’d like to see some more leaves fall. We’d like to see some more action.”