Dak Prescott opens up about lo...

OXNARD, Calif. — As the Dallas Cowboys and Los Angeles Rams wrapped their joint practice Wednesday, players and coaches lingered on the field.

Players reconnected with teammates, present and former alike. They tipped their hat to opponents, greeted their families, and worked with equipment staffs to return jerseys and pads to their appropriate buckets.

But before the crowd had cleared or even thinned, one quarterback was missing.

Where was Dak Prescott?

Prescott hadn’t altogether skipped the pleasantries. He’d efficiently connected with Rams players, from quarterback Matthew Stafford to receiver Puka Nacua, even seeking out first-round rookie edge rusher Jared Verse to laud Verse’s potential and wish him a healthy, productive career.

Then, Prescott slipped into a nearby open tent overlooking the Cowboys’ training camp fields. He took a seat on a folding chair in a shadowed corner, away from some of the bright spotlight that’s now doused him for more than eight years as the Cowboys’ starting quarterback.

Surrounded by his girlfriend, Sarah Jane Ramos, and his physical therapist, Luke Miller, Prescott lifted his 5-month-old daughter, MJ, in the air. He whistled with MJ and spoke to her. A smile canvassed Dak’s face as MJ showed off a particularly smiley day herself, laughing and babbling in the arms of her father.

In the corner of this tent, in this moment of fatherhood, Dak could escape.

He had just led the Cowboys’ first-team offense through hours of team drills against the Rams’ first-team defense with mixed success. Dallas was committed to installing a new offensive concept even as the Rams' defense tested more established guidelines.

“You're frustrated about that and then come over here and get to see her laugh,” Prescott told Yahoo Sports. “Not that I don’t care about that, because I’ll get that cleaned back up in there. But to be able to compartmentalize it, leave it right there in between those lines, come over here. [MJ] makes me laugh, understand what life is about, understanding that I'll be able to clean that up.

“It’s very joyful.”

It’s through this prism that the Cowboys quarterback is contemplating his contractual NFL future, months removed from finishing second in voting for league MVP last season. Prescott’s resumé, throughout his career and in 2023, has long been a lightning rod for talk shows and fodder for debate far beyond the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex. Prescott knows the arguments for and against his next chance to reset the quarterback contract market, for and against his status as an upper-echelon quarterback in the NFL.

And yet…

“The best way to put it,” Prescott said, “is I’m free.”

Let him explain.

Cowboys and Prescott’s future decisions will require ‘two-way street’

Contractually, after this season, Prescott will indeed be free. The Cowboys have yet to reach an extension with their 2016 fourth-round draft pick who’s started every season since, and no-tag and no-trade clauses give Prescott a leverage rare in this market.

Only Kirk Cousins, playing for the Minnesota Vikings and now the Atlanta Falcons, has reached free agency in a similar manner to how Prescott could next spring.

Prescott is currently the longest-tenured quarterback in the NFL for one team. The Cowboys say publicly that they want Prescott’s services beyond 2024.

“We hope this season — that it gets done before the start of the season,” executive vice president Stephen Jones told Yahoo Sports on Tuesday. “I mean, that's our goal. The thing that happens on these contracts 99% of the time is you're kind of out there and then all of a sudden it happens out of nowhere.

“You just knock it out.”

Prescott has said publicly he’d be glad to stay with the Cowboys. But he’s also not rushing Dallas. He did not hold out of offseason activities or training camp this year, as his teammate CeeDee Lamb is. (Prescott supports Lamb’s decision and acknowledged receivers face a different risk than quarterbacks as they can get hit.) The chance to test the market has allure, whether or not it ultimately leads to an extension in Dallas.

That brings us back to Prescott’s freedom.