Jerry Jones says no hard feelings between him and offensive stars

The tensions were high during the Dallas Cowboys offseason as their two biggest offensive stars entered the final years of their contracts with the pressure on to give them extensions.

Quarterback Dak Prescott remained calm and focused on Football, showing up to training camp and insisting that he wasn’t worried about the Business side of things. For his part, if a new deal didn’t get done, he was likely going to sign with a new team after the 2024 season, as he’d have become a free agent.

Wide receiver CeeDee Lamb, on the other hand, held out of offseason practices and all of training camp while he waited for the deal to get done. The tensions were a bit more obvious here, as Cowboys owner Jerry Jones voiced that he felt no urgency to get it done, while Lamb responded with a sarcastic “lol” on social media.

As for Dak, although he had a calm exterior, he made a few comments that indicated he was tuning out the noise pretty much for the sake of not getting distracted by something Jones might say. Jones said that the contract negotiations with Prescott were more about the team than the quarterback, and Prescott said he stopped listening to Jones’ public comments “a long time ago”. So, yeah, there was still tension.

Money solves all problems

Well, both Prescott and Lamb got their deals done with the Cowboys and now everyone is all smiles.

Just one month after Jones’ “no urgency” comment, Lamb signed a four-year, $136 million contract extension with a record-breaking $38 million signing bonus, becoming the second highest-paid non-quarterback in the NFL with an average annual salary of $34 million.

Nine days after Jones’ comments about Prescott, the Cowboys QB signed a four-year, $240 million contract extension, earning him an annual average salary of $60 million and becoming the highest-paid quarterback in NFL History.

Money talks. Everything else is just noise. And now, all tensions are *poof* gone, according to Jones.

“I’ve never seen anybody get their feelings hurt enough that the money couldn’t cure,” Jones said. “When you have a significant decision, or you have a significant event in your life, when it gets in the crosshairs where the parties are in agreement. If your goal is to get a deal done, nail it right there. Do not fool around. And it started happening for us.”

Indeed, the deals got done. It took longer than what seemed necessary and ended up costing the Cowboys more for it, but it got done. Now that Dak’s deal is done, Jones’ expectation is that he’ll help lead them to their first Super Bowl since the 1995 season.

“I will say this: Any time that we’ve ever made players the highest-paid player - key players, such as Troy Aikman, the highest-paid player in the game - we’ve won Super Bowls.”