Dak 'Only Cares About Winning!' Is Aikman Right?

Many figureheads in the NFL landscape are quick to criticize Dallas Cowboys' quarterback Dak Prescott for a multitude of reasons that all trickle back to one factor: the star affixed to his helmet.

But along with the naysayers there exists a contingent of his believers around the NFL and in the media. Within that group, one rare person can truly understand all what encompasses Prescott's job, and that's former Cowboys' quarterback Troy Aikman.

Playing under center for "America's Team" is one of the more challenging positions in all of professional sports. Those pressures become heightened with an absence of postseason success, an issue that bled into the Prescott era in Dallas.

The Cowboys' quarterback posted a career year in 2023 and has proven himself as one of the premier players at his position. But the team still has not been able to get over the hump.

Amid the star's ongoing extension talks with the team, Aikman warned about the dangers of dragging these discussions out for too long.

"I think he's gonna be the first quarterback to get to $60 million... and the longer this goes, the more I think he'll be playing somewhere else," the Hall of Famer said on the Pat McAfee Show .

"If it continues to drag on and he plays great and then the Cowboys come in late and say 'Now we wanna pay you,' I don't know where his head will be at that point..."

As Aikman also alludes to, Prescott wants to win and these continued shortcomings have increased the burden on him and the franchise.

Related: Source: ‘Patient’ Dak Prescott Can Sign $70M Per Year Contract

Said Troy: "He doesn't care about anything but winning, and it frustrates him beyond imagination that they haven't had more success in the postseason. And it's the only thing keeping him from really being mentioned with Pat Mahomes and some of the other greats.''

We can debate there.

Dak "only cares about winning''? The contract dispute suggests he also has other concerns.

Dak is like Mahomes? Hey, Aikman knows better than we do, but ...

This much seems true: The Cowboys' best chance of competing for a title is with Dak Prescott at QB. If Dallas believes that to be the case, the Joneses need to bend.

But if Dak "doesn't care about anything but winning''? Dak needs to bend, too.