{"id":465554,"date":"2026-02-08T02:28:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T02:28:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/465554\/"},"modified":"2026-02-08T02:28:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T02:28:09","slug":"cowboys-rumors-on-george-pickens-franchise-tag-contract-talks-ahead-of-nfl-free-agency","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/465554\/","title":{"rendered":"Cowboys Rumors on George Pickens Franchise Tag, Contract Talks Ahead of NFL Free Agency"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Dallas Cowboys are expected to apply the franchise tag to wide receiver George Pickens, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This would lock Pickens in for a salary of around $28 million<\/a> in 2026, while he and the team can negotiate a long-term extension.<\/p>\n

The tag reflects how well the 24-year-old performed following his trade to Dallas last May. He set career highs across the board, catching 93 passes for 1,429 yards and nine touchdowns.<\/p>\n

In the buildup to the Pro Bowl Games, Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott made it clear he wants to see Pickens back.<\/p>\n

“It doesn’t matter, whichever way that they got to do it, he’s an important piece of this offense, an important piece of what we’re trying to do,” Prescott told reporters<\/a>. “I’ll leave it to those guys. Obviously if I need to get involved, I’ve said it before, I will. But (I’m) confident in (Cowboys owner Jerry Jones) and everybody who makes those decisions and how much he means to us.”<\/p>\n

Jones also told Tommy Yarrish<\/a>, who writes for the team’s official site, that he’s “looking forward to getting things worked out so George can be a Cowboy a long time.”<\/p>\n

If recent history is any indicator, a resolution may not come quickly.<\/p>\n

The Cowboys traded star pass-rusher Micah Parsons to the Green Bay Packers in August as the two sides were locked in a stalemate. A year earlier, that’s when Dallas finally had its breakthrough with wideout CeeDee Lamb. Prescott’s most recent deal came together right before the team’s opener in 2024.<\/p>\n

Using the franchise tag on Pickens is a tangible indicator that Jones is serious about bringing him back. Now, it’s on ownership to pony up the dough for a multiyear deal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Dallas Cowboys are expected to apply the franchise tag to wide receiver George Pickens, according to ESPN’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":465555,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[559],"tags":[64,63,593,85],"class_list":["post-465554","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nfl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465554","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=465554"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465554\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/465555"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465554"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465554"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465554"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}