It was all smiles and warm, fuzzy feeling last Wednesday after the Dallas Cowboys announced that they had agreed with wide receiver Dez Bryant on a brand-spanking-new five-year, $70 million deal just ahead of the deadline for franchise tagged players to negotiate new contracts. With Bryant signed on for the foreseeable future, the talk in and around Dallas turned to the structuring of Dez's deal and whether or not the team had included language that would allow them to jettison the mercurial wide receiver should behavioral or, likely more specifically, issues as it pertains to breaking the law, were to arise during the life of the deal.
It eventually came to light, via commentary from Jerry and Stephen Jones, that the team had added no special language to the deal to ensure that they could part ways with Bryant with little fuss or financial loss if need be. A recent report suggests that simply may not be the case and that the small bump from the value of the wide receiver franchise tag, $12.8 million, to a new guaranteed figure of $16 million to be paid to Bryant between now and March, has helped create the illusion of security for Dez that simply isn't there.
"What the Cowboys did is brilliant," a source familiar with the contract said, via Jason Cole of Bleacher Report. "They gave Dez an extra [$3.2 million] to get the long-term deal now and make him show up. But if something goes wrong and he defaults on the contract, they still have it. They don't have to go after him. He has to go after them, and that's a lot harder to do if you have other legal problems."
"When you really think about it, what the Cowboys did in this deal tells you a lot about Dez," a general manager from another team told Cole.
There's no denying that Bryant has become one of the best receivers in the league. Even his monumental final stat line last season - 88 receptions, 1,320 yards, 16 touchdowns - doesn't do justice to the dominant manner in which he amassed them. But there's also no denying that Bryant seems to represent something of a character risk, even if he hasn't been arrested as a member of the NFL brotherhood thus far. Reports of police being called to his house, Bryant parting ways with his longtime mentor and confidant, David Wells, and rumors of a video tape, alleged to carry images of a damning nature, have followed Bryant in a way that simply is not the norm for most NFL players.
No, he has not been a legal issue for the Cowboys as of yet, but his handling of his negotiations with the team and the reported fear of the Jones' and the rest of the Dallas brass over what he'd do with major guaranteed money certainly seems to paint the picture of a player one would be hard-pressed to deem "trustworthy." As Cole points out in his report, Bryant is "consistently late to meetings and other team functions" and has "no sense of time management."
Thus, it's not hard to see why the Cowboys - assuming Cole's report is accurate - would craft a deal that protects the franchise should something major and unforeseen occur.
Bryant is a beast on the field - as long as he keeps his physical and mental dominance there and there alone, he's certain to see the full term and value of the deal. If he doesn't, it sure sounds like he could be out of a job quicker and cleaner than the initial reports after the contract signing would have had you believe.
