Cowboys 2015 Free Agents: Franchise Tag Coming For Dez Bryant?

Most of the Cowboys offseason speculation has been centered on what will happen with free agent wide receiver Dez Bryant and free agent running back DeMarco Murray. It has generally been assumed that there is no way the Cowboys let Bryant go, so he would either get a long-term deal, or the team would franchise tag him while trying to work out a long-term deal. Based on some comments Stephen Jones made, they are leaning toward the latter. From the Dallas Morning News:

Jones is planning to meet with Murray’s representative, Bill Johnson, this week, but expressed uncertainty about having a sit-down with Tom Condon, one of Bryant’s agents and a big power broker in the NFL.

"We haven’t gone that far," Jones said.

This news was interesting and indicated the Cowboys are leaning towards applying the franchise tag to Bryant — speculation Jones didn’t attempt to squash.

"Right now all things being equal, it’s leaning more Dez with the franchise than it is not," Jones said. "But that doesn’t mean it will stay that way.  We don’t ever want to give up on a long-term deal," Jones continued. "It’s something we worked on all of last year and it kind of cooled off once we got into the season. We’ll continue to see what our options are and things happen quickly as you go along. Things can go along with a lot not going on, but all of a sudden it happens."

So basically, a meeting with DeMarco Murray's agent is set for this week, but nothing is on the schedule for Dez. Like Jones said, things can change quickly in the world of contract negotiations, but that certainly sounds like they will slap the franchise tag on Bryant, at least temporarily. That's not exactly a surprise, but interesting to note.

More interesting would be to know just what the parameters are of a deal that will be discussed with Murray's agent.