2026 Offseason Preview: Dallas

The Dallas Cowboys will spend their offseason trying to parlay a talented roster into a contending roster

statbutler.com will be compiling offseason previews for all 32 teams in the lead up to free agency. Feel free to share any of the text/visuals below with attribution. All underlying contract data was collected by overthecap.com.

Recent Team History

The Cowboys missed the playoffs in their first year under Brian Schottenheimer, but the offense rebounded strongly after a disappointing showing in 2024 where Dak Prescott missed most of the season. The defense, on the other hand, took a step back after star Micah Parsons was dealt to Green Bay.

2025 Season

Even after using some of their Micah Parsons haul to bring in Quinnen Williams from New York, the Cowboys defense remained one of the worst in the NFL. There were very few positive games on the whole on the defensive side.

As a result of the defensive struggles, Dallas fired defensive coordinator Matt Eberflus at the conclusion of the season. Eberflus has been replaced by Christian Parker. Parker is in his first coordinator role after successful runs as a defensive backs coach with the Broncos & Packers.

Returning Players

Note that all restructures below are assumed to be max restructures. This means that the team will use void years to prorate cash across up to five seasons, minimizing amount that will hit the current year’s salary cap.

For players who are not vested veterans, I’ve replaced information about the player’s active contract with a description of the team control remaining until the player can become an unrestricted free agent.

The offense was powered by strong season from Dak Prescott and his two top pass catchers, CeeDee Lamb and George Pickens. Considering the team has spent three of the their last four first round picks on offensive linemen, 2025 was a mediocre showing up front. This is especially true at tackle, where 2024 first rounder Tyler Guyton was unable to to take a step forward. In the final three games of 2025, Tyler Smith took over at left tackle and had a solid run, just as he did as a rookie in 2022. Guyton and opposite tackle Terence Steele received a bottom 5 pass blocking grade from PFF among 56 offensive tackles with at least 400 pass protection reps in 2025.

The Cowboys defense might have the league’s top interior defensive line trio in Quinnen Williams, Kenny Clark, and Osa Odighizuwa. If that group can more consistent coverage quality on the back end, along with some second level run support, there is no reason this defense can’t turn things around quickly.

Expiring Contracts

It’s not a huge outgoing free agent class for Dallas, but there are some high volume contributors in this group. Former second round pick Javonte Williams had a great season and may look to cash in on the open market if the upper tier running backs like Breece Hall, Kenneth Walker III, and Travis Etienne return to their teams. I expect Dallas will have some interest in seeing if they can bring back Jadeveon Clowney or Dante Fowler as situational pass rushers again.

Projected Tags & Cuts

I’m not including ERFA eligible players here (expiring contracts with less than 3 accrued seasons), as they can either sign a league minimum contract or the team can allow them to leave.

Perhaps the top prize in free agency will be George Pickens. Pickens is the only player that I feel confident will receive the franchise tag, which should be in the neighborhood of $28m. This is rumored to be the case already. If Brandon Aubrey doesn’t iron out a new deal in the next month to be the league’s highest paid kicker, I would think he’ll be offered a second-round tender, which should be just under $6m. No team will make a competing offer and the tender will be rolled into his coming extension.

As far as cuts go, LB Logan Wilson is the one that sticks out the most to me. As it stands now, Wilson would be the 23rd highest paid linebacker in 2026. I don’t think he did enough after arriving from Cincinnati to justify that level of compensation in a year where the draft and free agency already appear to have a strong crop of linebackers. Malik Hooker is maybe the only other player that could be on the cut/renegotiation radar, although I’d lean doubtful as they already need to replace another safety.

Areas of Need

To me, cornerback feels like it is the most important piece that is missing without a clear replacement opportunity. The linebacker and running back groups are in worse shape, but those should be areas with sufficient options in free agency and the draft. On offense, I think Dallas just needs to do what they can internally to get better at tackle and see if they can replicate their 2025 success. On defense, they should be open to getting better at every position beside the interior defensive line.

The Salary Cap

In the image below, each blue bordered rectangle is equivalent to the cap hit of a single player. Within that rectangle, there are more rectangles that break down the player’s cap hit. Areas colored green can be pushed entirely into future cap years via max restructure. Areas with vertical bars are “locked in” and the team cannot open them up by releasing the player. They represent either fully guaranteed cash that hasn’t been earned yet or remaining proration from cash earned in previous league years.

As of this writing, OverTheCap has Dallas at something like $29m over the 2026 salary cap (which you can see by the red vertical line above). It sounds bad, but the Cowboys won’t be faced with any really difficult decisions. As you can see below, the Cowboys have $143m of fully guaranteed cash due in 2026 that can be reduced to $28.6m. As long as teams do not overspend, there is no reason not to do this. The fully guaranteed nature of that money means it is a virtual certainty that it’ll hit the cap eventually. It might as well be as late as possible.

With that being said, after I build in my assumptions that include the Pickens franchise tag, Aubrey’s RFA deal, draft pick signing bonuses, and other future costs, I have the Cowboys slated to be spending $324m in 2026 which is 3rd in the league behind only the 49ers & Lions. Even though they don’t have any other major extensions to work on this year, I would be surprised if Dallas is willing to spend another $40m in 2026 cash on free agents and trades. If the Pickens deal gets done, which it should, don’t expect anything else too splashy from this team.

Draft Capital

Although Dallas gained an extra first round pick this year in the Micah Parsons trade and is expecting to pick up a pair of comp picks, the Cowboys have the 9th best draft capital stock to my trade based pick value model. The Cowboys had already sent their own third round pick to Pittsburgh in exchange for George Pickens and would go on to send their second round pick to the Jets. My trade based value chart breaks the Cowboys picks down like this on scale where the first overall pick is worth 3000 points:

• 12th (own) - 1738 pts

• 20th (GB) - 1318 pts

• Other 5 picks (112, 150, 177, 215, 225) - 250 pts

92% of the Cowboys draft value will likely be spent in the first 20 picks. I would think both will deliver defensive players.