Sturm: The Monday Stack – Time For Cowboys Catch-Up

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The Monday Stack – Time For Cowboys Catch-Up​

Cowboys are starting business and we project the contract that George Pickens will catch.​

Bob Sturm
Feb 23, 2026




Let’s dive right back into Dallas Cowboys offseason today with some projects I am working on that I wish to offer you updates, but first we must be mindful of the NFL calendar because we are definitely in the NFL “silly season” and that might require us to hold on tight as the Cowboys seem eager to make some waves.

The NFL Calendar remains rather consistent from year to year, but here in late February into mid March, we turn the page fully to 2026. Everyone has their coaching staffs set and now we go full into roster building season. Also, March 11 is the start of the new league year which is where salary cap compliance is enforced.



So, here we go. The Cowboys will be tagging George Pickens and will be keeping him. I expect they wish to get an extension done and I need to give you an impression of what that looks like to start off our February 23 edition of….

THE MONDAY STACK​

The Javonte Williams contract is done​

Over the weekend, the Cowboys got their RB locked in on a 3-year deal for $24 million with the first two years guaranteed at $16 million for an AAV of $8 million. This falls right at about the 16th best contract for RBs in a AAV world, so it is fair for all parties.



Williams is the right age and although it seemed that he fatigued as the year went on, I would argue that is a workload situation that the Cowboys must monitor moving forward. They will need to make sure they have more than one RB who can pick up blitzing LBs so that Javonte can not be worn down by Thanksgiving. They had him at over 80% of the snaps for several games this year, which is nuts. They have to add a RB if they don’t think they have anyone else who can play at least 20 snaps a game and help him out.

It is a good, fair deal and definitely one of the priorities for the UFAs that were in the building. Pickens and Clowney would be the other two, but of course, with much different degrees of urgency.

The George Pickens projected contract​

I enjoy doing this because it is usually pretty easy for those of us on the outside. Yes, the team tries to get a player for as little as possible and a player tries to get as much as possible. But, if you have the league contract database, it is as simple as looking at the comps in the neighborhood and adjusting for inflation. Add a little more or less for a player’s age relative to averages and presto. We can usually hit a deal within a few million before the talks even begin. Nobody is actually deviating too far. If you want the player and the player wants you, then we are usually just doing in several months what can be done in 10 minutes with a piece of paper.

So, let’s try.

There are no reasonable arguments against keeping Pickens on the roster, in my mind. He is entering his age-25 season and history shows us that a WR’s prime hits from about 25-to-28 years old. A four-year deal would secure all of that in Dallas, but clearly he has put himself in position to perhaps hit $30 million AAV over that time. Clearly, a season like 2025 in a Dallas uniform would go from an incredible bargain at $3 million to expected and required at $30 million once someone signs that deal.

In four seasons, he has produced that 2025 season only once as you can see below.



Now, we can explain that in a number of ways. First, he has never been on an offense that was as good as Dallas has while in Pittsburgh. He has never had a QB this good as he has in Dak Prescott. He has never had a WR partner as good as CeeDee Lamb that attracts the attention. And he has never played in a contract year where every yard and touchdown will add to his forthcoming leverage in a contract situation.

Now, below, we have the 10 highest paid WRs in the sport according to Spotrac’s database and I always sort for AAV (annual average value). I believe Tee Higgins is the comp because he is the only player on this list who is a team’s WR2 behind Ja’Marr Chase.



There are other WR2’s with big contracts in this league, but that one is the biggest so there is where he is trying to get if he wants to be in Dallas. Detroit’s Jameson Williams ($26.6 million AAV) and Philadelphia’s DeVonta Smith ($25 million) are also part of the conversation as other WR2’s who have signed extensions, but Smith did his almost two years ago when the cap was much smaller.

Higgins’ deal of $28.8 million also represents the approximate value of the franchise tag for a WR which hits at $28.8 million so we now see how both sides will be working. The $28.8 AAV is the absolute floor on a multi-year deal unless the player is in a great mood. Additional information that is quite important is the guaranteed money which for Tee Higgins was amazingly low. Pickens won’t go for that. As you can see from the far right column (above), the only player who has as little guaranteed on his deal is Terry McLaurin who is 30 years old and had a contentious negotiation last camp on just a 3-year deal. We could argue that Higgins took a very team-friendly deal where they can send him packing pretty much any time they want after this season with virtually no dead money.

Of course, a team would love to do that – sign an extension for $115 million but only actually guarantee $41 million. But, the player? He will be looking for twice that guarantee of money. I imagine due to inflation, the magic compromise number for Pickens is likely to be this:

Four years and $120m which is $30 million AAV and then they guarantee $75 million which is essentially the first 2.5 seasons of the contract. So, when they arrive at this extension on July 15, put me down for this.

George Pickens predicted contract: 4 years at $120m with $75m guaranteed.

“Picks for Players” – a list since 2018.​

Next, I wanted to create a list of the latest Cowboys trend of trading picks for veterans to add to their roster. Yes, this has been around for a while in the league, but you can see that from 2018-2022, the Cowboys executed this plan five times in five years to varying levels of success. Then, in March of 2023, they pulled the trigger on Brandin Cooks and Stephon Gilmore right as free agency opened. Since that day, they have completed 11 trades in less than 36 months that have largely been the same thing. We get your veteran and you get our Day 3 picks. Only the Quinnen Williams and George Pickens trades have been more expensive and we can probably agree that those are both good deals. But look at all the trades since March of 2023:

• 2018: Tavon Austin — 2018 6th
• 2018: Amari Cooper — 2019 1st
• 2019: Robert Quinn — 2020 6th
• 2020: Everson Griffen — 2021 conditional 6th
• 2022: Johnathan Hankins — 2023 6th (received 2023 7th)
• 2023: Brandin Cooks — 2024 5th + 2025 6th
• 2023: Stephon Gilmore — 2024 5th
• 2023: Trey Lance — 2024 4th
• 2024: Jordan Phillips — 2026 6th (received 2026 7th)
• 2024: Jonathan Mingo — 2025 4th (received 2025 7th)
• 2025: Kenneth Murray — 2025 6th (received 2025 7th)
• 2025: Joe Milton - 2025 5th (received 2025 7th)
• 2025: Kair Elam — 2025 5th and 2026 7th (received 2025 6th)
• 2025: George Pickens — 2026 3rd + 2027 5th (received 2027 6th)
• 2025: Logan Wilson - 2026 7th
• 2025: Quinnen Williams — 2026 2nd + 2027 1st (details vary slightly)

Now, if we do subtract the trades that cost Day 1 or 2 picks (Pickens and Quinnen) and focus just on Day 3, we might see that the hit rate is pretty rough. Gilmore and Cooks were decent and Mingo and Milton are still on the roster, but everything else looks like deals that harvested very little. Logan Wilson was the very definition of "Much Ado About Nothing" as he was released last week. They traded for him and quickly lost interest.

Project No. 1 - Grading the roster​

The following two projects have the same basic premise. And that is valuation. So much about roster building requires us to have some basic understanding of what things are worth. This is the most basic idea in anything revolving the business side of this sport. For instance:

• knowing what a fair contract is for a WR2
• knowing what price to expect to get a edge rusher in the draft
• knowing how much draft capital to pay for a veteran DT
• understanding how many pieces you need to “fix a defense”

These are all abstract discussions and I don’t want to get too abstract because I know everyone who reads this wants to gain a better grasp on things and not leave even more confused on what to think. So, my job here is to offer some more advanced concepts in as simple a way as we can. A good teacher cannot lose his class by talking about things that cannot be easily grasped.

So, the first thing I want to do is to try to put every player on this roster (and eventually many of the NFC rivals) into five bins of classification. Here they are.



We will have five classes of players. 5s will be the best in the league. If you are a top-5 WR or a top 5-corner, you get bright green. How will I determine “top 5”? Great question. It will be a moving target, but we will try to be reasonable about who makes this group and who doesn’t, but these guys are the best of the best.

4s will be the duller green and these are “above average NFL Starters” who would defined as being not in the top group, but better than the average starter. Roughly, the 6th-15th best at your position.

3s will be yellow and be dead-bang average NFL starters.

2s are guys who are either A) starters you would like to upgrade from, B) backup players who play part-time or in sub packages or C) really solid draft picks who have yet to fully “prove it” at this level.

1s will be everyone else.

Now, these are subjective but I will take the grading seriously. I expect you will see some guys in some bins and wish for further explanation or might want to campaign for a higher ranking. Let’s do it!

Here is my first pass through the Cowboys roster right now. See what you think.



My 5s: CeeDee Lamb and Quinnen Williams

4s: Dak Prescott, Tyler Smith, George Pickens, Osa Odighizuwa, Daron Bland

Here, I am not even sure I believe Bland is a 4, but I put him there for now. He is probably closer to league average for starting corners. Also, some might think Tyler Smith and Pickens are 5’s, but I also think that is a bit much for now. We can revisit.

3s: Beebe, Booker, Steele, Ferguson, Javonte Williams, Kenny Clark, Overshown, and Hooker.

The Kenny Clark one is interesting, of course. I am just not sure I saw much of a game-wrecker in 2025, but I would say he is probably close to a 4 for many evaluators.

Everything below that are either unproven or pretty ordinary.

Guys will rise and fall from year to year, but I think this is where I will start out.

Project No. 2 - Using ProFootball Reference AV​

Every offseason, I try to learn more about what existing studies are already out there. A few weeks ago, I jumped in the ProFootballReference AV numbers.

Here is a passage that describes it:

Approximate Value (AV) on Pro-Football-Reference.com is a metric created by site founder Doug Drinen to assign a single numerical value to any player’s seasonal contribution, regardless of position or era (dating back to 1950).

It aims to enable rough comparisons across positions and years by combining team performance, individual stats, playing time, and accolades into one approximate score. AV is not meant to be a precise measure of individual performance but a tool for broad rankings and analysis (e.g., career leaders, draft evaluations).

• AV starts with team-level performance (e.g., offensive or defensive efficiency relative to league averages) and allocates “points” to position groups.
• These points are distributed to individual players based on playing time (games played/started), stats (e.g., yards, sacks), efficiency adjustments, and honors (All-Pro/Pro Bowl bonuses).
• Seasons are prorated for fewer or more than 16 games.
• There are separate calculations for offense, defense, kickers, and punters.

So, then, I wanted to know what they considered “good” and I found this chart to show AV season descriptions.



So, now look at it on the PFR stat sheets for a big stats guy like Micah Parsons:



Here is one for an interior OL like Tyler Smith:



And here is CB DaRon Bland:



I don’t hate it. It sort of matches my views of each player.

In short, a “good year” is generally 10–14 AV (strong starter/Pro Bowl territory), while a “great year” is 15+ (All-Pro or better, with 20+ being truly legendary). These help compare across eras and positions, but AV works best for broad rankings rather than precise judgments.

Weighted Career AV (often displayed prominently on player pages and leaderboards) — This emphasizes peak performance: 100% of the best season, 95% of the second-best, 90% of the third-best, and so on (declining by 5% each step). It better highlights elite, high-impact careers over sheer volume.

Now, the reason I am doing this is to help look at drafts more easily. By having some valuation system, I believe it is better than no valuation system at all. Is it perfect? Probably not. But, let’s now look at the Cowboys drafts and use two metrics. We will add up the points from the draft chart to see how much draft capital they had to work with and then use the AV to see what they were able to get from the draft.

With that in mind, here is the 2021 Cowboys draft.



They used 2,287 draft points and have harvested 140 AV points.

Now, 2022.



You can see that DaRon Bland makes up for Sam Williams and Jalen Tolbert a bit.

Now, 2023 and 2024 show you the issues that they are dealing with today.

In 2023, they drafted almost nothing.



And then backed it up in 2024 with the same thing.



Now, obviously, the more recent the draft, the fewer AV points players will have added to their career totals. But, here is what helped the Seahawks just win a Super Bowl. Here is their 2023 haul:



Of course, you see 109 points vs the Cowboys 28 in that same year. But, you also see they had 3,661 points to use in their draft and Dallas had just 1,255. Thank you, Russell Wilson trade.

That is why draft currency is so important to consider and to hoard.

Here is Dallas in those two important categories from year to year:



Now, you can see how they were considered a very good draft team from 2018-2022. Unfortunately, 2023 to present has killed them, but the books are not fully closed, either.

AV is interesting and I think I will adopt it here. It even has a Hall of Fame component that I liked, too.

A career AV of 150+ raw (or 120+ weighted) suggests an outstanding career with legitimate Hall of Fame discussion, while 200+ raw (or 150+ weighted) marks inner-circle greatness and near-certain enshrinement when paired with typical accolades. Check PFR’s career AV leaderboards or individual player pages for exact current totals, as they update annually. AV is approximate and best for broad comparisons rather than definitive judgments.

That is plenty for today, I am sure.

This week at SturmStack​

Here is this week’s schedule:



I swear, NFL Franchise Rankings are happening this week and I am on to cornerbacks in the Sturm 60. Also, a big review of Christian Parker’s defense is soon as is a Rangers season primer with Jamey Newberg is about to get cooking.

Lots!

 

[Smitty]

Seattle had a ton second day picks which we habitually can’t draft well in.

 

[Bipo]

Tyler smith is a top 5 OG. Easy

 

[Chocolate Lab]

These are all abstract discussions and I don’t want to get too abstract because I know everyone who reads this wants to gain a better grasp on things and not leave even more confused on what to think. So, my job here is to offer some more advanced concepts in as simple a way as we can. A good teacher cannot lose his class by talking about things that cannot be easily grasped.