*With less than an hour to go before today’s 4 p.m. deadline, Dez Bryant and the Dallas Cowboys agreed to a five-year, $70 million deal that will pay him an average $14 million per season, league sources told ESPN’s Chris Mortensen.
The contract comes with $45 million in guaranteed money. Under the franchise tender, he was set to make $12.8 million for the 2015 season but had threatened to miss training camp and some regular season games if he did not have a long-term deal in place by the 4 p.m. ET deadline for franchise-tagged players to negotiate a multi-year contract.
Sources told ESPN’s Todd Archer that the deal includes a $20 million signing bonus.
According to ESPN, Bryant was at the Cowboys facility today to sign on the dotted line as the organization worked with his contract representative, Tom Condon.
The Cowboys thought they were close to a long-term deal with Bryant last year that would have avoided the franchise-tag drama, but the talks fell apart and ultimately led to Bryant changing agents from Eugene Parker to Roc Nation and Condon.
Condon and Roc Nation’s Kim Miale met with the Cowboys after the NFL scouting combine in February and again in late June, but those discussions didn’t push them closer to a deal. As the deadline approached, Bryant let his feelings be known through social media.
In addition, a source told ESPN that the NFL Players Association promised to look into possible collusion between the Cowboys and Denver Broncos, who were negotiating a long-term deal with receiver Demaryius Thomas. According to the source, the union said it has credible information that the Cowboys and Broncos shared details of their negotiations with their respective receivers.
Ultimately, both sides got what they wanted all along: Bryant got his long-term security and the Cowboys secured the rights for one of the game’s best receivers for multiple years.
It just took some time to get there.
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