The REAL REASON The Cowboys traded for Joey Porter Jr...

The shocking truth has just been revealed on the Joey Porter Jr trade as following last night's blockbuster move by Jerry Jones and the Cowboys we now have new reports and rumors surrounding JPJ a contract extension is that coming looking at what the expectations are for him this season and the possibility of him even playing in a couple days this Sunday in Houston so much to get to and let's go right to it right here today on Cowboys Digest we appreciate you watching and we hope you're having a great day wherever you guys might be in case you missed it last night the Cowboys made the trade for Joey Porter Jr it was Tom Pellicero who was on it first we had talked about the trade potential for JPJ for the past couple weeks now we knew the Steelers and him were at odds in terms of contracts and that he was not going to get on the field without a contract but that does not seem to be the case here in Dallas but either way with this trade we knew it was going to be growing you know a possibility and it grew more and more likely with every single injury in the secondary it seemed like that just continued to be a thing to look at you obviously now have Daron Bland JPJ and Caleb Downs as your starting cornerbacks we're missing Kobe Durant or potentially missing Siobhan Rebel this week so if the fact that we could get JPJ out there this week would be you know absolutely phenomenal of course is the question of whether or not he can play or not now Adam Schefter had the report earlier today saying there is a chance that new Cowboys cornerback Joey Porter will make his Dallas debut versus the Texans per league sources the Cowboys are going to work to get him ready for Sunday and need him with their secondary depleted by injury Porter could go from being ruled out for tonight's game in Cleveland the Steelers were playing Cleveland Thursday football to then playing this Sunday in Houston versus the Texans and boy does that really give a boost to the Dallas Cowboys now that's exactly why I'm trading yes on Calshi for the Cowboys to win this game right now $80 on Calshi is going to get you $174.95 back the Cowboys are at 44% on Calshi so go check it out today because this is a trade that you can't pass up and you're obviously going to be trading directly against other users not the house like a digital sports book with Calshi you're writing yes or no contracts in the outcome of events across sports the politics or even the weather now if you are interested in trying out our presenting sponsor Calshi you can use the link in the description or in the pinned comment and when you sign up with code digest NFL new users who trade $25 are going to get 55 extra dollars immediately added to their account so right there $25 turns into 80 instantaneously highly recommend you go check it out especially with that trade right now for the Cowboys to win this weekend and I'm telling you go check it out it's super super fun now okay what's the actual likelihood of him playing there's still so much he has to do and so much things he has to like learn for the Cowboys well one of those things that he had to do is now officially you know put through he passed his physical today sources say he is meeting now with Christian Parker trying to learn the defense and again the hope is that maybe he can play this Sunday in Houston week number four if not we do have a Thursday night game coming up next week against the Buccaneers so worse comes to worse he was actually supposed to play on Thursday night football tonight instead he'll just play a week from tonight and we'll play in his first game at the count with the Cowboys then I'm hoping he can play this week because it would be way more beneficial for the Cowboys given the injuries to play this week than next but still whenever he can get in I'm very excited to see him and also really glad he got here and passed his physical obviously with the you know monsoon rain that's going across Dallas right now I'm very happy that he was able to get in here but in terms of what we can expect a contract coming all that stuff there's a lot of things to kind of look at and so let's start with of course the statistics and where exactly people think that he should be and all that so Joey Porter Jr among all quarterbacks in 2025 was third and passer rating allowed he was sixth in completion rate allowed he was tied for third and fourth in completions and he had the most snaps with zero touchdowns allowed he is an elite cornerback and he is going to be asking for elite cornerback money in fact we had the report from Mike Florio that basically said that the Steelers they don't offer out for just north of 27 million dollars this year at least and he declined now again we don't know the details was it just this year was it just two years was it a full four-year extension we don't exactly know and that could be a real difference maker but now the Cowboys are in an interesting spot just because they kind of have to figure out what the extension is well it doesn't seem like Joey Porter Jr is going to require an extension to play at least that's the expectation in fact we got this from Ed Werder who kind of gives us that confirmation thing a source confirms that like his teammate George Pickens newly acquired Cowboys quarterback Joey Porter Jr is fine with playing in Dallas without a contract extension he's willing to play it out because the Cowboys are the team he most wanted to play for in leaving for the Steelers this is where the Cowboys using their brand name is such a nice thing and people will play for us and be able to kind of you know put the contract on the line because they wanted to be here so given that confirmation well we could see him this Sunday we could see him next Thursday and it doesn't have to be you know included it doesn't have to include a contract extension we knew that when he was brought over here he was not going to have that contract extension so as of right now he's just making 4.9 million dollars here in 2026 obviously he'll be a unrestricted free agent past that in 2027 so understanding all this there is some financial things that the Cowboys they're going to have to try and figure out here over the next couple of you know months into the offseason with a lot of different people having uh some interesting agents we'll say interesting agent but uh do want to kind of make this kind of synopsis is kind of funny the Cowboys and Steelers have made so many trades now that we can kind of wrap it up into one big thing the Cowboys have traded for George Pickens, Roderick Jones, Joey Porter Jr. and a 2027 4th round pick and the Steelers got a 3rd round pick which ended up being Drew Eller a 5th, a 3rd, a 6th, a 6th and now a 2nd as well in 2028 so I don't know if you can say if the Cowboys won the trade overall I guess but I do think that this is kind of funny that you look back on this and you know that's a lot of picks going back to the Steelers and fun fact that 6th round pick that conditional 6th round pick the conditions did come out it is a basically if Joey Porter Jr. plays in two games you get the pick going to Steelers so I'm expecting for that to be a real thing the 6th round pick should go to Pittsburgh and then also that 6th round pick is actually the Steelers pick funny enough so it just goes back to them now in terms of extensions and what that looks like in the future for him the Cowboys now have 20 players including him set to be unrestricted free agents in 2027 six of those are represented by David Mulgetta, Pickens, Porter, Overshown, Locke, Roderick Jones and Malik Hooker this is interesting just because if you know the lore Mulgetta is the agent that had Micah Parsons and that is you know something that did not exactly pan out well and ended up moving Micah Parsons but it is kind of interesting especially when you think about what transpired with Micah Parsons I mean go back to that instead of paying him what was wanting to be 46.5 million dollars per year the Cowboys traded him for two 1st round picks and Kenny Clark they now traded away a round one and round two pick for Quinton Williams and Joey Porter Jr whom they're expected to pay a combined 65.3 million dollars should they get the JPJ extension done which you know could be around 30 million dollars or more I do think that this is kind of a hard like take and I don't know if it's supposed to be bad or good but it is obviously something to look at when you think about what the Cowboys did I know that Micah is injured right now you also got two players not to mention Kenny Clark on top of that so I think there is some ways to look at that and maybe both a positive and negative light so I think it'll be interesting to kind of see what exactly that this kind of looks like and and how we get to the point where we can kind of motion down with the contract extensions that being said there is some financial things you now have to figure out and kind of look at because you have some financial flexibility in some ways but you also don't when you come to the off season you have 20 million dollars this year so and if he's not going to take an extension generally having that money to spend this year still however there are some ways that you want to kind of try and keep JPJ and George Pickens around this offseason saw this going viral wanted to put up there there is a way that they could do it they can cut slash trade to Ron Bland which now with Joey Porter jr there is you know thought process that's more likely Bland has you know an out in 2027 it would save us about 36 million dollars future cap and about 21 million dollars in dead cap and you can obviously you know spread that across you can restructure DAC and CDS contracts so you can add some space there and then cutting Terrence Steele you know is gonna you know help them a little bit if you cut him post June 1st it saves 11 million dollars in theory you got 20 million dollars you add 64 you got 84 million dollars you could you could easily be enough for next season at least for Pickens and JPJ but then you've got a lot of money in your two wide receivers a cornerback and a quarterback that's kind of what you have right now I mean obviously you're paying to run blend a lot of money but it is a lot to think about and kind of see what the movement is and whether or not the Cowboys really want to keep JPJ for a long term and I think it does depend on how he performs what he does if he has a big moment because if he has a big moment in Dallas I guarantee you that they're gonna do a lot in their part to go out there and try and keep him and I kind of expect a big moment and that just comes from his statistics if you think about the Cowboys defense this past year yards per pass were 31st passer rating 31st 40 yard passes allowed there were 30 second touchdown pass allowed 31st Joey Porter Jr. last year out of 75 corners had the fifth best strides per target the fifth best catcher out and that had no touchdowns allowed and the second best passer rating allowed he is an elite cornerback so that's where I think the extension if he wants it the Cowboys would probably be willing to pay him that but let me know what you think down in the comment section and obviously let me know how you feel about this trade the morning after we appreciate you watching we'll see you next time peace out