As quiet as the Dallas Cowboys have been on the open market this offseason, the same is true for their internal order of business. Quarterback Dak Prescott, wide receiver CeeDee Lamb and star pass rusher Micah Parsons are all due for raises on their next deals. The Cowboys have expressed clear interest in keeping all three in Dallas for the long haul, but no extensions have been signed.
What’s the pecking order of importance between the three? Who could be the odd man out? Can the Cowboys end their championship drought with all three on massive deals? We asked The Athletic’s Cowboys beat writers, Jon Machota and Saad Yousuf, to evaluate the situation
Between the three big contracts the Cowboys have on deck, how would you rank them in terms of importance?
Machota: Dak Prescott, Micah Parsons, then CeeDee Lamb. Prescott is the team’s leader and plays the most important position. There just aren’t enough franchise quarterbacks available in the NFL. His deal is also going to take up the most salary cap space. Parsons is an absolute game-changer on defense. You could argue that drafting him is the biggest reason Dallas has put together three consecutive 12-win regular seasons. Lamb has become one of the NFL’s elite wide receivers and deserves to be paid like one. However, it doesn’t make a lot of sense to make someone one of the highest-paid wide receivers and not know who will be getting him the ball. And that’s another reason getting Prescott’s deal done is atop this list. To maximize Lamb’s value, the Cowboys need to have a quality starting quarterback.
Yousuf: When one of the players in the group is a franchise quarterback, that will always be at the top of the list in importance. Prescott gives the Cowboys a sense of security. He has a strong presence as a leader in the locker room and is a top-10 regular-season quarterback on the field. Whether you’re a front office or a fan base, Prescott is the type of player you can talk yourself into as the guy, despite all of the postseason shortcomings over the past decade or so.
The Lamb and Parsons situations are a bit more nuanced. Both are among the very best at their positions — elite talents the Cowboys drafted in the first round. However, as mentioned, Lamb plays a position more dependent on his surroundings, particularly the quarterback. He has a good rapport with Prescott, but if there’s an issue with Prescott, it trickles down to Lamb, too. Lamb’s talent is indisputable, but his chemistry with a non-Prescott quarterback is a mystery.
In a league where the quarterback position is the most important, pressuring the quarterback is highly important, too. Few do it better than Parsons. The main reason an extension for him falls to third for me is simply because of the time the Cowboys have, as Parsons still has two years left on his rookie deal.
