00:00For the first time in 15 years, the Cowboys are pursuing the biggest name available to kick off an NFL
00:06offseason.
00:07It's historic.
00:08I mean, last time this happened, shoot, I mean, the Mavs and Dirk had just won the championship.
00:15That's how long ago this was, boys, that they were in on Nnamdi Asamoah in the strike-shortened offseason of
00:222011.
00:23I'll never forget it. I was in the hospital.
00:24Well, Abby was being born, and Richie and Grego, Rage, in the afternoons are reporting that, you know,
00:32Jerry live on the air that afternoon was talking on the phone and handing phones back and forth,
00:37and they were, like, kind of high-fiving on the turf at the Alamo Dome in San Antonio that they
00:43got the deal done.
00:44That's how long it's been.
00:45I remember that because we were all sitting in the press box.
00:48I think, Dawson, you guys were on the opposite side of the stadium, right?
00:52Yeah.
00:53You had this broadcast position up on the opposite, and we were all in the press box.
00:57We were watching them hand the phone to, like, Rob Ryan.
01:01Like, they were practicing and just passing the phone around like they –
01:05and I was talking with Mike Lombardi, who was with – at the time, Mike was in Philly, and he's
01:12going,
01:13man, he goes, you don't have this deal done.
01:16This is not –
01:17Wow.
01:17This is not – because I was texting with Mike.
01:20I said, the Cowboys are acting like they got this done.
01:22He goes, no, this is Philly.
01:24This is – Philly's got this one.
01:26And they did.
01:27And the Cowboys actually dodged a bullet that day, which is a painful reminder that sometimes these deals will not
01:32go your way.
01:32They ended up signing Brandon Carr, I think, the next offseason to find their free agent corner.
01:37And since then, it's been absolute crickets.
01:39No more than $6 million spent on an outside defensive free agent this entire time.
01:44But the Cowboys are in the big game this year.
01:46So, it's worth talking about some more with you.
01:49Segment's brought to you by the Frankels.
01:51If you've been injured in a car or truck wreck, call the Frankels first, 214 or 817-333-3333.
01:58There's never an out-of-pocket cost.
02:00They only get paid when you win.
02:01The Frankels are the go-to car and truck wreck attorneys in Dallas.
02:04Rangers getting blanked.
02:05They've been putting up a lot of runs, but not today, as the defending AL champion Mariners got them shut
02:11out here in the bottom of the fifth inning.
02:14Rangers have managed to scrape out two hits.
02:17The Rangers have managed to get two hits, but that is it.
02:21All righty.
02:23Diana Rossini said two things of interest, really.
02:26To isolate it, Cowboys remain very interested.
02:29And GMs believe the Raiders are willing to work on a deal.
02:32The idea from yesterday that the Cowboys were close, but the price got too high, that either evolved or expired
02:40or, you know, I don't know exactly how that was phrased by all of the insiders.
02:45But for a while yesterday, we felt like, yeah, price got too high.
02:48Teams are willing to do more than what the Cowboys are willing to do.
02:52You know, but then, you know, the report comes that the Raiders are willing to work on a deal.
02:58That means this thing is, you know, still fairly early in the bidding war stages where, you know, now we
03:07find out the Cowboys are still interested and maybe ready to have more conversations about bringing Max Crosby to the
03:14Cowboys.
03:14So, you know, that is, I think, one thing to celebrate if you're a Max Crosby super fan.
03:20And I don't know, I get caught up on it and I forget that there are lots of other great
03:24options to team build out there, you know, like, and Joseph Hoyt Morning News wrote a piece today about how,
03:32you know, the Cowboys argument for and against trading for Max Crosby.
03:38And, you know, some of the details in this story are very interesting.
03:42And the case for adding him is very legitimate, you know, and I think he makes some great points here.
03:47But he writes, the problem for the Cowboys, they have a lot of needs.
03:50And while they're opening up cap space to be aggressive, Crosby would still not be cheap.
03:56He's scheduled to have a cap hit of $35.7 million.
04:00So, you know, you've got to take that under consideration if you're a fan and you're hoping for the absolute
04:07best outcome on this.
04:08Is that the best way to spend $35 million?
04:11We started here with Micah last season with Jerry Jones saying four or five players are better than one.
04:19Would that not still hold up with Max Crosby?
04:21Sorry to cut you off, Brian.
04:21You wanted to jump in.
04:22No, I was going to say something, Dawson, and I apologize.
04:24I didn't mean to jump in there on you like that.
04:26But I know there's some really, really, really smart people that have looked at his contract.
04:32And I know we talked about the reduction when you make a trade.
04:36You can take the number.
04:37They can restructure it, yeah.
04:38There's something to do with his contract with being able to take the money he's making and then prorate it.
04:47Yeah.
04:47You know, so.
04:48Or convert it into something else.
04:49Yeah, convert it, then you prorate it.
04:50You make it a signing bonus.
04:51Yeah, you can spread it out over five years.
04:53Exactly.
04:53You know, like I say, there's a lot smarter people than me that know all this stuff.
04:58And I'm like, okay, if that's something you can do, and we talked about it, then I can say you
05:07do owe it to yourself to at least explore it.
05:10Yeah, I think every contract in the NFL now is eligible for this flip of a switch, as Fish used
05:16to call it all the time.
05:17You can turn the year's salary into a signing bonus and spread that cap hit out over five years.
05:23Yeah.
05:23So any salary you see, it can essentially be made 20% of that.
05:27And 20% of $35 million is $7 million.
05:31Right.
05:31So, yes, that's a tremendous edge for the Cowboys.
05:34And if that's what they want to do, I think there's a way around this.
05:37Maybe that's what all teams are looking at right now.
05:40Yeah, I would think the Eagles, for sure.
05:41Maybe that's how Philadelphia's in this.
05:43Yeah, yeah.
05:44And if that's the case, they should be doing that with George Pickens as well as Jared Sandler stepping in
05:48the booth here.
05:49Looks like he's heading home.
05:50I think he's heading back to the table.
05:52Good to see you.
05:53We love you.
05:53Job well done.
05:55Mission accomplished for Jared Sandler here.
05:57A must follow on Rangers Twitter.
05:59But, yes, you know, and I was going to say, I've said a couple of times this week,
06:04that it didn't look like you could add Max Crosby, re-sign your kicker,
06:09and then have any amount of money left to make an impactful push onto your team.
06:14As far as adding players.
06:15But if you would do that with Max Crosby and then do that with George Pickens,
06:18I mean, what's 20% of $28 million?
06:21It's around, what, $5 or $6 million.
06:23Yeah.
06:24So you could free up all kinds of dough.
06:26If you get a long-term deal done with George.
06:28Yeah.
06:28Yeah.
06:28Absolutely.
06:29Yeah.
06:29Yeah, you know, and maybe it's five years and $35 million,
06:34but the first year's cap hit is only $7 or $10 million,
06:38and now you've freed up $18 million more.
06:41You've freed up $28 million more with the Max Crosby cap gymnastics,
06:45and now all of a sudden it's like, yes, we can afford two more $15 to $18 million players.
06:51And then if you do the same thing with them, you can get excited.
06:55There is an endless supply of money if you just keep creating more void years,
07:00and we'll see if the Cowboys want to, in fact, do that.
07:03What did you make of the fun stuff there with social media
07:09and Max Crosby listening to Shibuzi that was playing a song with a lyric about being a Cowboy,
07:15and while he's listening to it, Crosby zooms in to show what appeared to be light-up stars
07:20plastered to his ceiling.
07:22Maybe he's got, like, one of those space rooms for his daughter, you know, isn't he, a girl dad?
07:26Oh, yes.
07:27You know, so you go into the playroom, and it's like we got it blacked out with stars on the
07:31wall
07:31or stars on the ceiling.
07:33I think that's pretty cool.
07:34We've had a couple of those toys over the years.
07:36Yeah, I wonder if this is part of, like, the Trey Wingo a couple nights ago
07:40thinking maybe the Cowboys were in the catbird seat to make a deal,
07:43and then things have changed, and maybe he was thinking that that was going to happen,
07:47and now, obviously, we continue to wait and see.
07:50And I really don't know how much has changed.
07:53I think you've got Vegas is just kind of on their own time.
07:57It's Vegas.
07:58They've got to get something done by Monday if they really want to get this done
08:02or else everybody else is going to go, and they're just holding this thing up.
08:05They're waiting to see if somebody comes in with an anti-offer,
08:08but I think there's a mutual – I don't think there's been an official offer to your question, Brian.
08:13I think there's an understanding between both teams of what the deal would look like,
08:17and the Cowboys aren't willing to go up to X amount of points.
08:21I love the idea of them waiting until after the draft, though.
08:24And they did it last year with George Pickens.
08:26It allows us to keep this year's draft capital, and Jerry and Mark Davis are buddies.
08:32And Jerry told Al Davis, I'm going to take care of your son.
08:34There's a mentorship role.
08:36So what if Jerry goes to Mark and says, man, you might be able to get more after the draft
08:39because teams will be willing to give up next year's draft assets more.
08:42You're going to get Mendoza.
08:43You're going to be horrible next year.
08:45You're going to lose Crosby and not have a draft pick.
08:48You're going to be really bad.
08:49You're going to get the best tackler, edge, or wide receiver.
08:51Like, this is going to help you out long-term team building to make sure.
08:54And here's what we're going to do.
08:56Me and you, we're going to combine up here in about maybe June.
09:01Maybe it's in May.
09:03And we're going to light the league on fire.
09:06Everybody's going to be talking about the Cowboys and Raiders.
09:08Right now, free agency's about to happen.
09:10And there is nothing we can do to increase how much people are going to be talking about the NFL
09:15over the next 10 days.
09:16If you just stick with me, we're going to time this out for a dead period between the draft and
09:20training camp
09:21and absolutely dominate the news cycle for 10 days there.
09:24I just wonder, because if Brian's sources are saying they haven't made an offer, all right,
09:29and maybe they're slow playing it, sure, the Raiders might be holding out until the start of free agency,
09:35or Jerry might have convinced them we can crush the news cycle.
09:38We're already squeezing that lemon dry right now.
09:41We're getting all this juice, you know?
09:43Like, even if you traded Max Crosby right now to the Cowboys,
09:47I don't think you could get any more media attention than we got right now.
09:50Right.
09:50We're crushing this.
09:51Let's come back and do it again here when we execute the deal.
09:55And, you know, maybe more draft capital will be available from these other teams
09:59if you create a bidding war after they already get to use, you know, this year's picks.
10:04And I think it's a great strategy, you know?
10:06If you need to make the 2026 team as good as possible, you use your two picks,
10:12and then you trade next year's capital to make the 2026 team better.
10:15Yeah, and you have a guy from over the cap, Jason from over the cap.
10:20He says, I think there is some confusion on player trades.
10:23You do need the cap room to acquire the player.
10:26So you would need $30.8 million, give or take a bit, to get Crosby.
10:31Then the restructure happens after the fact.
10:34So you still ultimately get the cap relief,
10:36but you have to have the established requisite amount of money from a cap standpoint
10:41to actually execute the trade.
10:43So that's something to consider.
10:44I don't know how much more the Cowboys would need to do to get to that number.
10:48Well, it'd be $20 million, but even Archer just added to that
10:50and said there's things teams that are trading for that player can do beforehand
10:54to the contract to facilitate the trade,
10:56which I guess is what the Packers did with Rodgers before the Jets.
10:59So that's when the Cowboys can go and flip that switch in Crosby's deal
11:02to bring that thing down, which is, what, $23 million from $30 to $7.5 or whatever it is?
11:08Yeah.
11:08So, boom, there you go.
11:09They're good.
11:10Okay, so the Raiders can adjust the contract before trading.
11:12The Raiders flip the switch in order to help you facilitate the trade.
11:16Yes.
11:17Very interesting.
11:18Makes sense.
11:18Very interesting.
11:19Okay, the case for not adding him from Joseph Hoyt,
11:24problem for the Cowboys, they have a lot of needs,
11:26and while they're opening up cap space to be aggressive,
11:28Crosby still wouldn't be cheap.
11:31The case for getting him is pretty damning.
11:34Ezraku, Leofau, Houston, and Isaiah Land, and letting Clowney go,
11:39you got a big old bag of nothing over there at edge.
11:44And, you know, if Clowney was your leading sacks guy last year,
11:49he's going to be gone as well.
11:51But there are a number of guys out there,
11:52and there are more than one way to skin this cat.
11:55I just want to see Crosby come aboard and the Cowboys have answers
11:59at all the other spots so they can finally make a legitimate push
12:02to having the best roster in football.
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