ORLANDO, Fla. — Dallas Cowboys owner and general manager Jerry Jones talked once again on Tuesday afternoon at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Orlando to reporters as he offered a bit more clarity on the stranglehold that the salary cap has on his team at the moment and how that factors into how they make decisions for the future.
As it sits going into April, the Cowboys currently have $5.17M in available cap space with a rookie class that will need to be signed in the coming months as well as other additions to beef up both sides of the ball.
A prevailing thought is that Dallas can create cap space by restructuring deals for players such as Terence Steele, Trevon Diggs and others, but Jones said the rosters of the past three years have created a situation for where they now have to "pay the fiddler" with so many on expiring deals.
"I knew that it was going to be challenging, it always is," Jones said. "The nature of the cap has to be looked at over a several-year period. Because we have in place players that will be paid in future years, we have a good handle on that. What you do in cap management is you borrow your money from available dollars in the future to use it in current years."
"Most clubs, we included, have a lot of money that we've already paid the players, but you have to count under the cap in future years. It shouldn't come as a surprise, you have to have it well-thought out. It's got a very bright line."
The process started years ago, Jones said, as money had begun to get pushed out knowing that today would be a reality.
"The timing of them as well as the amount of them are all a part of a strategy that we were thinking about two years ago," he said. "In fact, it involves a player that was here two years ago. There's no surprises here because it's competitive."
Despite the cap limitations, Jones expressed confidence in the young core of his team – namely Jalen Tolbert, Sam Williams, DeMarvion Overshown and Mazi Smith – to step up in place of departed, more expensive veteran players.
"It's buoyed by the team we got, buoyed by the fact we have young players that have to step up," he said. "They will step up. Some won't as much as we wanted, some will do more. All of that, I feel good about. I feel as good as any time I've gone into an offseason as I can remember."
"We very well will have players that didn't play much in the last year that will step up that are under contract. By virtue of the moves we're making right now, it doesn't create a negative in my mind. Just because you don't have a player, doesn't mean you're not going to win the games."
