Jerry Jones Is Pessimistic About Keeping His 2 Best Offensive Players - And DeMarco Murray Could Be The Odd Man Out
While both are free agents, re-signing Bryant is the Cowboys' biggest priority, according to Jean-Jacques Taylor of ESPN.
Even if they can't agree on a long-term deal, the Cowboys can keep Bryant for the 2015 season by using the $12.5 million franchise tag on him.
There appear to be more serious concerns with bringing back Murray, however, and Jones did not sound all that confident in re-signing Murray along with Bryant. From ESPN:
"It's going to be a challenge. Is it financially reasonable? No. Is it possible? Yes. But if you just looked at it from dollars and cents, it probably doesn't look reasonable. You have to figure out how you get there, but at the end of the day you realize it's going to be costly to have both of those players."
Bryant and Murray are among the leaders in the NFL at their respective positions. Bryant grabbed an NFL-best 16 touchdowns and 1,320 receiving yards, while Murray scored 13 touchdowns and an NFL-best 1,845 rushing yards.
Murray has been somewhat injury-prone throughout his career, and at 26 years old, many teams would hesitate at giving a big contract to a running back who carried the ball 392 times in 2014.
Jones also told Taylor about the running back position, "In general, loading up on one player in an area that just requires good, solid consistency might not be the way to go."
The Cowboys have the 27th pick in the NFL draft where they should be able to grab a decent running back if needed, and they also have Murray's back-up Joseph Randle, who played well behind Murray this season.