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FRISCO — The wait — 10 minutes or two years, take your pick — was finally over. Somebody pulled the plug on Paul McCartney in mid-sentence of “Maybe I’m Amazed,” an elevator at the Star dinged and out strode the Cowboys’ $160 million quarterback. No hiccup in his rebuilt gait, either. Dak Prescott was feeling so good, he even thought about jogging out and leaping onto the stage he shared in the lobby with Jerry and Stephen Jones, but he didn’t think we were ready for that sort of thing.
He shouldn’t underestimate expectations for him or the Cowboys going forward, but it appears his are no less than yours.
For that matter, when a reporter asked the Joneses if the Cowboys are now the best team in the NFC East, Dak beat ‘em to the buzzer.
Let’s make it unanimous, then, even if it’s not saying much. Neither Philadelphia nor Washington can say who its quarterback will be, and Jason Garrett is still trying to make lemonade out of Daniel Jones.
Dak, for one, didn’t stop at conquering the NFC Least. He’s had a bigger vision for awhile, you could say.
So what if his right ankle hadn’t imploded in the game against the Giants?
What would have happened to the Cowboys?
“We obviously won that game I was in,” he said, smiling. “We were gonna win the next one, we were gonna win the one after that and so forth.
“So we’d be celebrating the Super Bowl here in Dallas.”
You could write it off as a light moment, and if anyone deserves one after all he’s been through, it’s Dak. Even if $160 million makes for a pretty nice salve. The thing is, he wasn’t trying to be funny. He talked about the fire lit under him when somebody else has something he wants. He said it burns hotter every year he doesn’t make a run at a Super Bowl.
Then on top of that fire, heap the image of Dak sitting on the turf at JerryWorld, holding up his leg and trying to find an angle for his ankle that made sense, and look what you’ve done.
“I’m just excited to be out there and show you what this team is going to do,” he said, then left no doubt exactly what he thought that might be.
“The next big press conference we have is hopefully in another year, after that big parade.”
An aside to Dak: Careful how you toss out parade references. People around here take them seriously. I once wrote that the Mavs would come back from Miami on a parade float, and there are people in this town who haven’t forgiven me 15 years later.
Anyway, no matter what happens this fall, fans love this sort of brash talk. Might not go over so well with Mike McCarthy, who has to cash that check, but you know it rings sweetly with Jerry. He likes to remind Stephen that, at 78, he’s running out of time for excuses.
Jerry removed a significant roadblock with the signing of his quarterback, even if it took him more than two years to do the heavy lifting. Jerry did everything he could Wednesday to leave the impression that it was nothing personal. Merely business. He quantified his love for Dak in the only way he knows how, by the numbers. Not only is Dak the highest-paid player in the organization’s history, he’s getting more than Jerry paid for the franchise. If that doesn’t make you tear up, you’re not Jerry’s accountant.
Helps, no doubt, that Dak appears to be on schedule in his rehabilitation. In fact, he spent the morning before Wednesday’s big unveiling working out with other injured Cowboys at the Star. He didn’t offer much in the way of specifics or projections, but he said he could do things Wednesday that he couldn’t on Monday. He also said he’d be ready when he needs to be.
“I’ll be better than I was before,” he promised.
As nice as it will be to have Dak back, you may recall that the Cowboys have a few potholes to fill on the road to Los Angeles next February. They took a “major step,” Stephen said, with the hiring of Dan Quinn, who apparently will coach a defense that will more closely resemble Rod Marinelli’s than Mike Nolan’s. Dak said he has heard nothing but rave reviews from people who have played for Quinn.
“If we do our work in the offseason,” Stephen said, “I think we’re gonna check that box.”
What that means is using the draft and free agency to find help for the defensive line and in the secondary. The odds are fairly good because they’ll be drafting high, and Dak’s contract, believe it or not, leaves them some wiggle room.
Had the Cowboys not gotten a deal done before the tag deadline Tuesday, Dak would have cost them more than $37 million against the cap. Because of the manner in which the deal was structured, even though his deal averages $40 million a year, he’ll only count $22.2 million toward this year’s cap. Don’t ask me how this sort of accounting works. I’m still mesmerized by the Wisconsin senator’s tale of how many dollar bills it takes to reach the moon.
By putting his money on Dak and assuring us he’ll have enough resources left to fix the defense, Jerry effectively placed the onus on McCarthy. But that’s a column for another day. By all accounts Wednesday, there were no losers.
“The Cowboys won today,” said Jerry, who looked so happy I didn’t have the heart to ask if the first check had cleared yet.
Find more Cowboys coverage from The Dallas Morning News here.
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