00:00We are four days away from the start of, you know what, I'm just going to say from the start
00:06of NFL Free Agency.
00:07I don't want to say legal tampering every time.
00:09You know what it is. I know what it is.
00:11It is the start of NFL Free Agency.
00:15Corey, and I believe we've got another list or perhaps a hodgepodge of players that you have broken down.
00:22Yeah, yeah, absolutely, man.
00:24This is when we were checking out other positions that we might be able to see.
00:28We wanted to, a lot of people have been talking safety.
00:31Caleb Downs, obviously, the draft person we like.
00:34I think there's a little more, again, the information we got from medical over the weekend from the combine.
00:42Right.
00:43I want to, because you said that was one, and that was a Chicago Bears doctor.
00:47Yeah.
00:47I want to get information from my guys before I make any decisions there.
00:52And at 1 o'clock today, Alec, I will kind of dive a little bit back into that,
00:58because I've got a mock draft that has three players that we have to make decisions on.
01:02So it's a lot of fun.
01:04But this list from Cowboys Wire, and it is our friend KD Drummond.
01:10The dude does some fantastic work every time.
01:12He puts up some really good stuff.
01:14Go ahead.
01:15You know what's crazy about that?
01:16I think I've mentioned this before.
01:18My sister-in-law's name is Katie Drummond.
01:22And so she's randomly texted me and be like, I had people say that you mentioned me on the radio
01:28today.
01:29And I'm like, I did not.
01:30And so I was like, oh, yeah, this is probably what it is.
01:34So now, Katie, I did mention you.
01:35There you go.
01:36Good job, buddy.
01:37Good job.
01:38All right.
01:38So the list goes like this.
01:41Nick Cross.
01:42Nick Cross, he was with the Colts.
01:46He is at 24 years old and expected average of $8.9 million.
01:51All right, Kevin, here's what we need to kind of figure out together.
01:55We need to figure out our budget.
01:58Okay.
01:58Because we've kind of been throwing around a lot of players,
02:01and I've been putting everybody around $10 to $12 million and saying, yes, sign them.
02:06Yes, sign them.
02:07Right.
02:07And I think with what the Cowboys have done so far, they've rolled the budgets on Tyler and Dak and
02:15Seedy,
02:16and that opened up enough to get them around $7 million underneath the cap.
02:19You say there's still room to work under that cap.
02:23And how much can you get me again?
02:26Where do you think you can get me based on where we are and we're giving George Pickens a long
02:31-term deal?
02:31So I think now I can still get you free and clear about $58 million now that I know that
02:39they seem pretty intent on keeping Terrence Steele.
02:43The original $70 million deal was off of the idea that you were not going to keep Terrence Steele, but
02:51that does appear to be their focus.
02:53So I'm going to say $58 million, and that's if you get the long-term deal done with George Pickens.
02:58But you also have other opportunities if, like, say you extend Quinn and Williams, and this is without Kenny Clark.
03:06So they would have to redo that deal, too.
03:09And with Kenny Clark, do you say that would open up some more money to both of those would open
03:13up a little bit more money?
03:14Yeah, I mean, Kenny Clark right there, if you can redo that, you can open, depending, probably up to, I
03:20would say, $11 to $13 million, depending on what the structure of that contract looks like.
03:24Because whenever people are like, look at his salary cap hit, he has no guaranteed money.
03:28So, like, his salary cap hit, realistically, if you want it to be a zero.
03:32So we have $58 million.
03:34Let's go with that budget right now.
03:35We have about $58 million that we're going to open up with, Alec, and that provides us with four $10
03:43to $16 million players.
03:45Sure.
03:45Somewhere in that range we can kind of work within that budget.
03:48And I know people are going to bring up the draft picks.
03:50Don't worry.
03:51There's a couple of other things I could carve out.
03:53Yeah, you need $14 million to be able to have a training camp.
03:56Okay, no to that.
03:58That's what Stephen told us.
03:58No.
03:59All right, so about four $10 to $16 million players.
04:03And I think the safety world puts us in, okay, we can go ahead and check off one there.
04:09And that gives us the $10 million for that player, maybe a little bit less.
04:14Okay.
04:14Nick Cross at $8.9 million.
04:16PFF grade, $59.8.
04:19All right, so that's where we sit with it.
04:21He's not my favorite.
04:22That feels low.
04:23Yeah, it is pretty low.
04:25Reed Blankenship is a name that a lot of people have asked about.
04:29Especially with Christian Parker.
04:31That makes a lot of sense.
04:33It's a guy that understands Christian Parker's system, plays well within it.
04:37And some people keep saying, hey, please don't take Reed Blankenship from us.
04:42Which is what you want to hear from Eagles fans.
04:45Just like they said when opposing fans are like, don't take Christian Parker.
04:50Yeah.
04:50That feels like a good thing.
04:51Now, that being said, he has a PFF of 42-6.
04:54Kevin, that doesn't matter to me whenever I watch him play.
04:57I watch him play, and that grade doesn't feel right to me because he's the kind of player that fits
05:03what you're asking of him.
05:06I don't know exactly.
05:07This is where the teams get really mad at fake scouts.
05:11And I say fake scouts.
05:12I'm a fake scout, I guess, because I've never truly been a scout.
05:15I'm just watching what I'm watching.
05:16But they're like, why are you grading it when you have no clue what his responsibility is?
05:20And whenever I watch Blankenship, there were a lot of good things I liked about him.
05:24But I still think that if you get him at $7 million, that's his annual average right there.
05:29Okay.
05:30If you get him at $7 million, I don't think that I'm getting the best player.
05:35And I feel like I could have used about $3 million more to get another better player.
05:39And by the way, I just want to point this out.
05:42And this is, I feel like, particularly relevant.
05:44And even if the average value, like if people are saying the average value of his contract will be $7
05:49million,
05:51like far more often than not, that is not going to be the salary cap hit that you take in
05:57that first year,
05:58especially the longer the deal is.
06:00Look, we talked about it.
06:01Javante Williams is a great example.
06:03So you do a three-year, $21 million deal, and you would give, how would that function?
06:08Let's just use that.
06:09Let's be honest.
06:10I think that cap hit could be $3.5 million.
06:12This year?
06:12Yes, and if you think that's crazy, consider this.
06:15Javante is three for 24, so that's $8 million a year.
06:18You know what his cap hit is this year?
06:19$3.9 million.
06:21That's almost four.
06:22Yeah, that's true.
06:23And if you're wondering how the Cowboys do it, most NFL teams have gotten a lot into this.
06:28They create those magical void years, which aren't real,
06:32but they just exist for you to spread out the money across more than that.
06:36And I know what you're thinking.
06:37You're like, well, what the hell happens when you get to the void year,
06:39and that player's not here, and you're still not paying for him?
06:42Well, that's what happened with the Dak conversion.
06:44Yeah, we'll worry about that later down the road.
06:46Yeah, in 2028.
06:48And again, Cowboys fans that might be upset about the Cowboys and the history of the Cowboys
06:54and the things that they've done, this is us doing our best job to try and say,
06:59we're going for it this year and maybe next year, too.
07:02All right?
07:02We're trying to push the chips really in.
07:05We're trying to take the Cowboys.
07:07Kevin's figured out the monies.
07:08He's figured out the financial situation for it, and he has said, we're going after this.
07:14So we're trying to find the players for him.
07:17Jalen Hawkins from New England, 28 years old, 74.9 PFF grade, a $9.7 million annual average
07:27that you're working with there.
07:28So this is a dude that I can definitely see playing in this system.
07:31He fits very well, has the speed that I like at the position.
07:34This is a guy that I'm perfectly okay with.
07:37Adarius Washington, Kevin, 27 years old.
07:40Got an 80.9.
07:42Okay, so.
07:43Expected annual average is $2.9 million.
07:46Can I play some devil's advocate here?
07:48Can we be hyped up about the positive PFF grade if you're telling me don't worry about the low grade
07:55on Blankenship?
07:56Alec, I don't know if you've got a chance to watch him.
08:00He is not my favorite in this bunch, nor is he on my, well, I guess he could be ninth
08:07on my list.
08:09Alec, your thoughts on Adarius Washington?
08:12I loved him out of college.
08:13I really did.
08:14TCU guy, local kid, extremely athletic, and the comeback story is awesome, too.
08:21But when I watch him, he's like a heat-seeking missile.
08:24He's really fun.
08:25He's very aggressive.
08:27I would take the chance on him just because I don't know how many other people in the league are
08:31going to.
08:32When it comes to what he just said about the aggressiveness, Kevin, when I watch Baltimore and watch their defense,
08:40there were some times where I felt like that was one of the problems.
08:44They were a little too much going aggressively into things, and that's why they got beat deep a lot of
08:50times.
08:51Their run defense was atrocious last year.
08:54They had a really hard time defensively.
08:57I'm not blaming it all on him.
08:59He did play well within the system, but there was a little bit of, was that your responsibility?
09:05I think here's the thing.
09:06And I've watched a number of defensive breakdowns this offseason of the Seattle Seahawks, the Vic Fangio defense, and a
09:17couple other defenses.
09:18And one of the things I'm finding more and more about these is these schemes are built a certain way,
09:23but you have to have intelligent, smart, disciplined players within them.
09:29If you have players that are headhunting or going out and finding ways to get their stats, the defense won't
09:36work.
09:37And it's very good.
09:38The Mike McDonald defense is brilliant.
09:40You take a look that you have, and all of a sudden you drop this into a cover three deep.
09:47So you're not just saying, we're just covering this section of the field.
09:50We've pushed everything back 20 yards deep, and we're covering it a different way than the quarterback expected, plus we're
09:56getting the push up front.
09:57You have all these different ways that these defenses are doing it, but they all have to work and engage
10:02together.
10:02And their responsibilities, if you are out of place, it screws some things up because of the way that the
10:08zones are built.
10:09So you have to make sure you don't have dudes that are out on their own mission.
10:12Unless the team knows that dude's going to make a play, we have to do the R-Jobs 2.
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