After trading for George Pickens this offseason, the Dallas Cowboys couldn’t have imagined the deal working out better than it has over the last six weeks. The Cowboys would probably like to have a better record than the 2-3-1 mark they have after Sunday’s loss against the Carolina Panthers. But Pickens continued to perform at a high level, adding nine catches for 168 yards and a touchdown in the losing effort.
The monster game has Pickens with 23 catches for 357 yards and five touchdowns over the first six games. More importantly, Pickens has looked like the perfect No. 2 complement that Dallas has been searching for to pair with wide receiver CeeDee Lamb. But just as Cowboys fans feel like they’ve found their guy, Pickens’s contract situation might be what takes it away from them.
With this being the final year of his contract, Pickens may be playing himself out of the Cowboys’ price range. His performance thus far has matched what is expected from a top-tier free agent, which could get him a massive deal next spring.
George Pickens’ Breakout Season Could Price Him Out of Dallas
Just a few months ago, it didn’t seem like Pickens was going to get his money. His time with the Pittsburgh Steelers led to solid production, with Pickens making 174 catches for 2,841 yards and 12 touchdowns over his first three seasons. However, those efforts came with an insane amount of baggage to the point his former head coach, Mike Tomlin, called on him to grow up at the end of the year.
Perhaps the trade gave Pickens a wake-up call, or he’s just thriving in offensive coordinator Klayton Adams’s scheme. Whatever the case may be, Pickens is on pace for career-highs in receptions (65) and touchdowns (14) to go with his first 1,000-yard (1,011) season since 2023.
Set to turn 25 in March, the Cowboys could envision Pickens being a long-term fixture of the offense. The only problem with that idea is that keeping Pickens in the fold long-term won’t be cheap.
Brandon Aiyuk is in a comparable situation to Pickens, catching 269 passes for 3,931 yards and 25 touchdowns over his first four seasons with the San Francisco 49ers. Entering the final year of his contract last season, Aiyuk signed a four-year, $120 million contract extension with $45 million guaranteed, and that might be the baseline of an extension for Pickens.
Tee Higgins is another high-priced example that Pickens and his representation could look at when deciding where extension talks with Dallas will start. After catching 257 passes for 3,684 yards and 24 touchdowns in his first four seasons, the Bengals used the franchise tag on the Clemson product before his age-25 season. Higgins responded with 73 catches for 911 yards and 10 touchdowns in 2024, which led to a four-year, $115 million extension with Cincinnati last offseason.
In many ways, Pickens’s situation could play out a lot like Higgins’s did with the Bengals. The Bengals had a high-priced quarterback (Joe Burrow) already on the books, but signed Ja’Marr Chase to a four-year, $161 million extension on the same day they signed Higgins.
With Dak Prescott and Lamb on the books for the Cowboys, it will be interesting to see if Dallas can fit Pickens into its long-term plans, especially at Spotrac’s projection of four years and $104 million. A franchise tag is also possible, but the Cowboys are already $9.7 million over the salary cap for next season, and another big deal may be something Jones is looking to avoid after trading Micah Parsons.
The Cowboys may be best served by beginning negotiations with Pickens as soon as possible. But as Prescott and Lamb can attest, that’s not how Jerry Jones has conducted business in recent years. It’s a sign that Pickens’s value could continue to skyrocket if he continues his performance and prices himself out of the Cowboys’ plans.
