It has been almost two weeks since free agency began, by way of legal tampering to be clear, in the NFL, and the Dallas Cowboys have made several changes to their roster to better prepare for the 2026 season.
As exciting as the Rashan Gary, Jalen Thompson, and/or Cobie Durant moves are, those are only a few things that the Cowboys have been tending to since the offseason began at large. Dallas opened up 2026 needing to figure out what was going to happen with two players specifically in wide receiver
George Pickens and kicker Brandon Aubrey, and they executed different moves with them individually to buy more time.
Pickens was given the non-exclusive franchise tag and Aubrey had a second-round tender placed on him. More may come from that before the season actually begins, but right now things are kind of treading water.
New updates are murky to say the least
A couple of hours before the NCAA Tournament, Calvin Watkins of The Dallas Morning News issued an update of sorts regarding these situations.
The “updates” here are essentially that there are no updates. Watkins even noted that there have been no contract talks when it comes to Pickens and that it sort of seems like he will play the year out on the franchise tag.
For what it’s worth, Watkins notes that much can change between now and training camp. Given the nature of the franchise tag, the George Pickens situation is going to be resolved one way or another before then. Specifically, the Pickens situation will be “resolved” in some literal way by the afternoon of July 15th.
Let’s clear up the Brandon Aubrey confusion, in case you have any
As things relate to Brandon Aubrey, the factual foundation of everything is that the Cowboys placed a second-round tender on him which pays $5.76M. That is important to rest all of this on.
There have been a lot of reports around this story, though. The week of the NFL combine featured a ton of updates on this front. Let’s recap it all and catch you up so that you aren’t lost.
- As the NFL combine was beginning it was reported by Clarence Hill that the Cowboys had an offer out that would make Brandon Aubrey the highest-paid kicker in the NFL. At the time there were no specifics of how this would be the case (APY, guarantee, total guarantee, etc.), and notably Kansas City’s Harrison Butker carried the league-leading APY for kickers then at $6.4M. That has since been surpassed by Houston’s Ka’imi Fairbairn at $6.5M.
- It was reported by ESPN that Dallas did have a deal out that cleared Butker’s, but that Aubrey’s representation was asking for closer to $10M annually.
- In the aftermath of these reports Brandon Aubrey responded to an Instagram video from 105.3 The Fan where the hosts were discussing a report from Calvin Watkins specifically that noted Dallas’ offer to Aubrey was $7.5M per year. This is the Instagram post in question. Aubrey simply responded by calling it “fake”, but given that the hosts also discussed the reference to $10M annually it was unclear exactly what Aubrey was referring to as being fake. It remains a bit vague in that sense.
- There was, understandably, a lot of confusion about what was real and what was allegedly fake. Clarence Hill noted that Dallas offered to make Brandon Aubrey the highest-paid kicker in the NFL back in September, but they did not offer $7.5M or even $7M annually. Hill added that Aubrey’s agent countered with a $10M offer as a way to “shut down” negotiations until the sides could meet at the NFL combine.
- Calvin Watkins issued an apology for reporting that Dallas offered Aubrey a deal valued at $7.5M annually. He said that this was a mistake and reiterated that the Cowboys had an offer that would still make Aubrey the highest-paid kicker in the NFL, although obviously there is room between what Butker was making at the time and $7M.
We are recapping all of this to avoid any confusion as noted, particularly given the cloudy nature that surrounded this thing when the reports were flying left and right. This is where things had come to rest before Thursday though, so the report from Watkins is a summation of it all.
