Report: Cowboys and Dak Prescott are not close to a contract extension

One of the biggest stories heading into this season for the Cowboys had everything to do with the most important player on their team... Dak Prescott.

Dak’s value to the Cowboys is so high because of the position that he plays. The NFL is a game that requires a quality quarterback, and the status of Dak Prescott as a franchise quarterback has been debated for a long time.

Prescott has been playing extremely well through the season’s first three games, though. He is operating at an MVP-like level almost a quarter of a way through 16 games, and considering he’s in a contract year, it’s likely that he’ll cash in big-time.

That could be some time away, though. According to a report from ESPN on Sunday morning, the Cowboys are still not close to extending their franchise signal-caller and they won’t be close in the near future.

A deal between the Dallas Cowboys and star quarterback Dak Prescott is not close at this time, and no extension is expected in the near future, sources tell ESPN.

No one doubts that a deal eventually will get done, given that Prescott wants to be in Dallas and the Cowboys want to keep him.

But a deal is not happening anytime soon, despite Cowboys owner Jerry Jones’ recent claims that an extension was “imminent.” This, according to sources, was never the case -- this deal has not yet gotten close to being done.

Jerry Jones did indeed say that a deal was “imminent” less than a month ago, but he backpedaled on that in the aftermath and pondered on the existential meaning of that word.

Dallas has already gotten long-term extensions done with DeMarcus Lawrence, Jaylon Smith, La’el Collins, and Ezekiel Elliott in the time since last season ended. They have Dak Prescott, Amari Cooper, and Byron Jones to go, and the longer that they remain on the to-do list the longer that people will fret over them.

For what it’s worth, under the rules of the current collective bargaining agreement (the NFL is in the middle of negotiating a new one so the status surrounding this could change) teams are allowed to use both their franchise and transition tags in the offseason after 2019. This could allow the Cowboys to protect two different players and as it stands they currently have at least three that they need to get deals done with.

Dak Prescott is going to get paid, we all know that. He plays the quarterback position and when you do so at a franchise level, you see a gigantic contract. Given how he’s playing, it’s fair to assume that the price continues to rise, we’ll see when the Cowboys are able to finally get a deal done.