Building the Cowboys, Mavs and Stars: Why 2 are making deep playoff runs (2024)

When it comes to the “Big 4” professional teams — Dallas Cowboys, Texas Rangers, Dallas Stars and Dallas Mavericks — in North Texas, the Cowboys always stand out. They are arguably the most popular sports franchise in the world, and remain the most profitable, according to Forbes. They dominate the sports talk airwaves year-round, locally and nationally.

And now, locally, the Cowboys are the only team without recent substantial postseason success.

The Rangers are the reigning World Series champions, capturing their first title in franchise history last fall. The Mavericks are one win from their first trip to the NBA Finals since their lone title in 2011. The Stars are two winsfrom returning to the Stanley Cup Final since their run in 2020. Whether the Mavericks and/or Stars join the Rangers as champions remains to be seen but where they are already — the conference championship round — is a place the Cowboys haven’t been in nearly 30 years.

Last week, Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott was asked about the success of the other three teams relative to the failures of his own team.

“It’s not jealousy, but yeah, it fires you up,” Prescott said. “A hundred percent. Yeah, any competitor should, damn sure, in my position, leader of the team, understanding what winning means here, not getting it done, and then watching your brothers across the city, go and make things happen. I want it for them. Trust me, I want it, because it only raises the stakes and makes it tougher on me. And I’m for that. Go win it. Rangers did it. Other two go do it. Put more f—— pressure on us.”

Comparing teams across different sports is always an inexact science. There is too much variance, from the state of the league to the conditions of operations, to make it an apples-to-apples comparison. However, there are some commonalities. A significant one that the Cowboys share with the Mavericks and Stars is working under a salary cap. The NBA has a “soft” cap while the NFL and NHL operate under more of a hard cap. But the existence of a salary cap, in any form, creates some shared considerations.

Let’s put the front offices under the microscope and see how the Cowboys, Stars and Mavericks have gone about constructing their rosters.

The Big 3

As Cowboys executive vice president Stephen Jones is known for saying: Player acquisition is a 365-day process. Around the calendar, the NFL, NBA and NHL each have three major player-acquisition opportunities. Teams can sign players in free agency, find young and cheap talent in the draft and make aggressive move for players in the trade market.

Historically, the Mavericks have heavily leaned on trades. Even their two franchise cornerstones selected in the draft, Dirk Nowitzki and Luka Dončić, were selected by the Mavericks through draft-day trades. Their 2011 championship roster was littered with arrivals by trade. Their first attempt to build around Dončić was also through a trade for Kristaps Porzingis and their second, more successful attempt with Kyrie Irving, is also a trade. Free agency was mostly a laughingstock and the draft, outside of two massive hits, was similarly embarrassing.

Looking at the Mavericks in this postseason run tells a different story. So far, four players have tallied more than 400 minutes:

• The top guy, Dončić, was a draft pick.

• The next two players, Irving and P.J. Washington, were trade-deadline pickups.

• The fourth, Derrick Jones Jr., signed in free agency.

• Go down a few more slots to a minimum of 200 minutes this postseason and you have another trade-deadline pickup in Daniel Gafford and another couple of draft picks in Dereck Lively Jr. and Josh Green.

Whereas the Mavericks show a stronger influence of the draft and trades, with a sprinkle of free agency, the Stars are built a little different.

The Stars’ top four scorers this postseason are all draft picks: Jason Robertson, Miro Heiskanen, Wyatt Johnston and Jamie Benn. Those are draft hits from different spots, including a top-five pick, a bottom of the first-round pick (stud goaltender Jake Oettinger also qualifies here), a second-round pick and a fifth-round hit. Roope Hintz, Logan Stankoven and Thomas Harley are also key contributors from the draft.

The fifth-leading scorer for the Stars this postseason is Tyler Seguin, who was acquired by trade. That’s also how the Stars got Chris Tanev, who has been phenomenal defensively in the playoffs. In free agency, the Stars have hit home runs with Joe Pavelski and Matt duch*ene, while also getting contributions from Craig Smith, Sam Steel and Ryan Suter.

The Cowboys are more lopsided in their approach.

Projecting their current offense (11 personnel), the Cowboys’ starting unit would feature 10 draft selections (including undrafted rookie free-agent signings). Only Brandin Cooks, who the Cowboys traded for last offseason, was not a Cowboys draft pick. It’s a similar story for their defense, where nine of the 11 projected starters are draft picks. Only linebacker Eric Kendricks and safety Malik Hooker, both signed in free agency, were not acquired in the draft.

The Cowboys have been a very good team, rolling off three consecutive 12-win regular seasons, so clearly they have a quality roster. It’s a testament to VP of player personnel Will McClay and the Cowboys’ scouting department that the draft has mostly been a stellar source of talent. The Cowboys are notorious for being quiet in free agency. They have made some solid depth trades in recent years but the reason the trades for Cooks and Stephon Gilmore raised eyebrows was because of their rarity. The only notable trade aside from those two was a midseason deal for Amari Cooper in 2018, which was mostly viewed as a fix to a problem created by a lack of activity in the preceding offseason.

To Jones’ point of player acquisition being a 365-day process, that hasn’t often been the case for the Cowboys.

Financial decisions

The biggest storyline looming over the Cowboys’ offseason is the contract statuses of Prescott, wide receiver CeeDee Lamb and pass-rusher Micah Parsons. All three players have top-of-the-market extensions due that would make them among the highest paid at their positions in league history. Prescott and Lamb, in particular, are lined up exactly the same: Both are entering the final season of their contract in 2024. Parsons has a fifth-year option so he has two years remaining on his rookie deal.

The vast majority of general managers in pro sports have their hits and misses when it comes to big deals. The Mavericks are paying big money to Tim Hardaway Jr., who is eating up nearly 12 percent of the team’s salary cap through next year. It wasn’t long ago that Benn and Seguin, both taking up around 11 percent of the Stars’ salary cap, looked like expensive liabilities and contracts that wouldn’t age well. The Cowboys have had recent misses with Ezekiel Elliott’s big extension in 2019 and Michael Gallup’s five-year, $62.5 million deal in 2022.

The Stars, in particular, have put together a clinic in juggling their major contracts. They’ve been fortunate that two of their best players (Heiskanen and Hintz), were low-maintenance negotiators and signed long-term deals for less than what they warranted, but they’ve also structured their financial book in masterful fashion. The secret behind their structure has been balance. The Stars have their top playmakers and earners staggered in a way where business doesn’t come tumbling down all at once too often.

As Harley comes due this summer, Pavelski and duch*ene’s deals will be coming off the books. Johnston, the Stars’ leading goal scorer this season, and Oettinger, one of the best goaltenders in the league, will need an extension in 2025. That same offseason, Benn, Esa Lindell, Radek Faksa and Suter’s cap numbers will all come off the books. Given their prolific drafting since 2017, the Stars have been able to get a net positive value from their roster, despite some players not playing up to their massive cap hits.

The Cowboys have found themselves hampered by major financial decisions on multiple occasions, even if they didn’t come together all at once. In 2019, the Cowboys were juggling looming major extensions for Prescott, Elliott and Cooper. They ended up giving a big contract to Elliott, along with linebacker Jaylon Smith, while waiting and allowing the price to go up on Prescott and Cooper. This year, they’re in a similar boat, with their finances being held hostage by those three big, top-market deals hanging over the franchise.

The hot seat

With the aforementioned factors of player acquisition and retention, the general manger is the face of these decisions. Whether it’s a bad judgment call or a series of unfortunate events, the GM has to wear the consequences. The biggest consequence is job security.

GMs Nico Harrison (Mavericks) and Jim Nill (Stars) have to think about that consequence. Harrison is relatively new on the job, hired in 2021 following a long run in the GM chair for Donnie Nelson, so he hasn’t had the clock ticking on him too much. Harrison came in and put his fingerprints on the team, reversing some mistakes from the previous regime and advancing the team in his own way.

Nill helped resurrect the Stars at a critical juncture in 2013 as the franchise was coming out of bankruptcy and embracing new ownership. Nill helped make the Stars formidable again but around 2018 and 2019, particularly with the Stars’ rough start in 2019, Nill’s seat was getting hot. The draft record through 2016 was rough and the big contracts weren’t aging well. Since 2017, Nill has virtually been King Midas. He was the 2023 GM of the Year and is a finalist to defend his crown in 2024.

The Cowboys’ GM has no fear of such a consequence. Jerry the Owner firing Jerry the GM is a novel radio segment concept but in practicality, Cowboys GM Jerry Jones knows that he never has to worry about the owner removing him from his post. No matter how many bad contracts or how flawed the philosophy, or how little postseason success, the Cowboys’ general manager doesn’t have to answer to anybody to make sure his job stays secure.

The owner and general manager of a team serve two distinct purposes: The GM is more concerned about putting forth a winning product while the owner being more concerned about putting forth a profitable product. When the same person holds both titles, the tiebreak usually goes to the “owner.” By that perspective, the Cowboys have been successful, not just among the local teams but more than any sports franchise in the world. But when it comes to winning, the Cowboys have fallen to No. 4 in their own market.

(Top photos of Luka Doncic, Dak Prescott, Jason Robertson: Melissa Tamez, Michael Owens, Christopher Mas / Getty Images)

Saad Yousuf is a staff writer covering the Dallas Cowboys and Dallas Stars. He also works at 96.7/1310 The Ticket in Dallas after five years at ESPN Dallas radio. Prior to The Athletic, Saad covered the Cowboys for WFAA, the Mavericks for Mavs.com and a variety of sports at The Dallas Morning News, ESPN.com and SB Nation. Follow Saad on Twitter @SaadYousuf126