The Dallas Cowboys held their annual state of the union news conference on Thursday to kick off training camp, and one descriptor came up more than any other: ambiguity.
After going into the offseason with an all-in mantra that never came to fruition, team owner Jerry Jones, chief operating officer and co-owner Stephen Jones and head coach Mike McCarthy spoke about myriad topics, principle among them being Dallas' unsure future thanks to recently stalled playoff runs and a number of stars seeking contracts right now or within the next year.
"The way that, as I sit here today almost 35 years -- you've got to help me with my mathematics here -- but almost 35 years, I see several faces that I saw 35 years ago here," Jerry Jones said. "But after 35 years, the one thing that's for sure is ambiguity. Just the nature of what being a part of sports and a part of football is is very ambiguous. The reality of it is you are continually, continually dealing with much unfinished business. ... We've had people with contracts that didn't come to camp. So you've got to make that reality. That's what happens.
"If I can be specific … I know we've been talking about what kind of offseason we had, what kind of season ending we had. Well, the facts are … but how many Pro Bowlers do we have out here? 14 Pro Bowlers on this field right now and 12 All-Pros. We've got an outstanding team. … We've got a lot of ambiguity in the team. I have ambiguity everywhere in the things that I look at and do. And so maybe the best thing that God gave me was a tolerance for ambiguity. That's what you have, that's what frustrates you. And in frustrating you, obviously it frustrates fans, to not have closure or to not have bright lines. That's not in my mind, that's not in my life. So I don't ever anticipate it getting any better with the NFL and the Cowboys. As a matter of a fact, since we last met here last year, there's been even more ambiguity thrown on the table. Hello, NFL. Good to be with you today."
The main purveyors of Dallas' ambiguity among players include Dak Prescott, heading into the last year of his contract that includes both a no-trade and no-tag clause, wide receiver CeeDee Lamb, who is currently holding out as he seeks a new deal, and pass rusher Micah Parsons, waiting in the wings and eligible for an extension after this season.
Prescott said Thursday that he's rooting for his teammates to get paid, but acknowledged he hopes his contract situation is eventually resolved as well.
"Those guys need to get paid and get their money. I've gotten a contract, and so the last thing I'm going to ask them to do is to take less," Prescott told reporters. "But this is a two-way street when you're talking about contracts. I've gotten older. I've got a decision in this thing, so it's not just one way here. As I said, it's about my agent and Jerry and those guys getting together and talking. They understand where I am. I understand where they are. From there, that'll get handled.
"But those young guys damn sure need to get taken care of, and if they get the biggest contracts, I'm a fan of it."
Although Lamb might or might not be the first domino to fall due to his absence, Prescott is undoubtedly the biggest. He's quarterbacked the Cowboys to five postseason trips in eight years since arriving, with the only season below .500 occurring when he failed to play double-digit games due to a fractured ankle.
Given all that Prescott has done, Jerry Jones made clear his belief and his preference that the soon-to-be 31-year-old keeps a star on his helmet past this year -- albeit with the caveat that failing to get what you want sometimes makes you stronger.
“I don’t think so," he said when asked if this could be Prescott's final season with the team. "Just to be very specific, I do not think that this will be his last year with the Cowboys at all. … It’s pretty clear, I think, I wouldn’t say it if it hadn’t been clear, of how much we appreciate what Dak Prescott has meant to this team in a positive way. And that the players do play better when he’s out there. He does make his teammates play at a higher level. There’s no question about it. So, I’m right there in line with his best fan.
"But believe it or not, in my life, I’ve had a lot of things I wanted that I couldn’t get because I couldn’t afford it. Now, have I learned to live with that in 80-something years? You bet I have, and life does go on. And sometimes when you get a bump like that, you turn around and do better than you would have had you got what you wanted. You’d have never known it had you not had to go get there.”
Prescott is currently the 13th-highest-paid QB in terms of his average yearly salary. Whether he signs again with the Cowboys or elsewhere in free agency, he will almost assuredly reside at the very top of the position.
Extending him is complicated by the aforementioned players starring around him, plus the financial weight of having paid top performers like cornerback Trevon Diggs and offensive lineman Zack Martin last offseason.
Lamb is currently unsatisfied playing on his $17.9 million fifth-year rookie option. Parsons already had his $21.3 million fifth-year option picked up for 2025. Both want and deserve to be paid at the top of their position groups, as well, currently $35 million a year for wide receivers and $34 million a year for pass rushers.
“I think it’s very unique that you have a top quarterback on your team as well as two players either side of the ball -- offensive and defensive player -- that feel like they’re, and rightfully so, they’re the best non-quarterback football players in the league," Stephen Jones said. "So you add that up and certainly it stresses the cap if you will. But we think we can get them both done. We think we can Dak done. We think we can get all of these things done. But it does require you to make some tough decisions in other places to draft and develop and play your draft picks.”
Part of this equation is why Dallas going "all-in" on the offense never added up. Teetering on the cusp with three consecutive 12-win seasons but three straight playoff exits before the NFC Championship Game to go with them, the Cowboys could've benefited from a free agency flourish.
Instead, the signings were few and far between. They brought Ezekiel Elliott back after a one-year hiatus and reunited linebacker Eric Kendricks with the team's new defensive coordinator, Mike Zimmer. The money is otherwise destined for the big three in question.
“Those three players you mean could be 70 percent of all the money you got -- 70 percent of your payroll," Jerry Jones said. "Now you need a little money for the other 51. That’s a challenge. Especially a challenge when you’ve used some of the very money you’re working with, you’ve used it for years past. … That’s not singing the blues. … What is a pleasure is that you’re dealing with that quality and that situation."
The season ahead represents an inflection point for the Cowboys' future that is very much dependent on how they maneuver to keep all three or some combination of Prescott, Lamb and Parsons.
It's also a crucial campaign on the sideline, as McCarthy is essentially engaging in a yearlong interview to keep coaching America's Team beyond 2024. Like Prescott and Lamb, he has nothing currently in writing to keep him in Dallas after the season ends.
Despite the whirlwind surrounding the Cowboys, this specific year's run at a championship won't be changed for better or worse by any contracts as long as Lamb is brought back into the fold and everyone stays healthy. Dallas rosters a majority of the same main pieces it had for the past three runs, which showed Super Bowl potential in the regular season only to fade in January.
That's why McCarthy, who was rarely asked questions Thursday sandwiched between the Joneses, wants solely to focus on the football of it and the winning.
If he and the rest of the team can rise above the ambiguity and deliver concrete results beyond where they've failed before, it would alleviate frustrations so many Cowboys fans have -- regardless of what happens after.
"Clearly my energy and my focus, and really the players and coaching staff, is not even close to what we’ve been talking about here the last 30 minutes," McCarthy said. "We’re excited and energized by this opportunity that’s in front of us. It starts with this training camp. … That’s just the reality of competing in the National Football League. The contract conversations, we talked about that back in the spring, and that’s really where it lies with me. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned the word contract prior to talking about it right now in quite some time. That’s not the way we’re wired, and we can’t be wired that way.”