Zeke’s “new” contract and workload history

[Verdict]

So far, he’s not HOF special, but he has been very good. But what good are his yards and production if after 5 seasons with him, it has translated to making the playoffs twice, and one wild card win? That’s how we should always judge value IMO. What has that player meant to this team in terms of playoff accomplishments? Too many Fans and apparently our FO are more enamored with stats than playoff wins.

I am sorry, but I couldn’t disagree with you more. The team’s record or playoff wins is not an indicator of how good a player is. That is just a very poor argument.

 

[Bobhaze]

I am sorry, but I couldn’t disagree with you more. The team’s record or playoff wins is not an indicator of how good a player is. That is just a very poor argument.

But what you said above is not my argument. You don’t have to agree- I’m saying the value of a high paid player doesn’t mean much to the team if the team collectively doesn’t win in the playoffs. That doesn’t mean the player isn’t a good player, it just means having that player has not made the team any more successful.

We’ve had Zeke for 5 years and we haven’t done much as a team. Doesn’t mean he’s not a good player or it’s his fault we haven’t done anything. Just saying that having him hasn’t translated to much team success. And that’s mostly on Jerry.

Again, you’re free to completely disagree with that opinion. Just wanted to clarify what it was and was not.

 

[Joe Realist]

he plays through 2023 and thats it

 

[Doomsday101]

No doubt Zeke has been durable without any major injury so far. But there have been some great backs who just faded because of overuse, not any particular major injury. Some guys who come to mind who were great but took too many carries- Earl Campbell, Shaun Alexander, Eddie George, Jamal Anderson…just off the top my head- guys who were great but then fell off a cliff after too many carries. It doesn’t have to be an injury to make a RB decline.

Jamal Anderson torn his ACL, Shawn Alexander 2006 broken left foot then the following season broken wrist. George continue to rush for 1,000 yards all the way until his 2nd to last year in football and his avg carry was never that great to begin with. Sorry injuries did play a part in these guys, it is not wear and tear they have 6 months off season the recover but in the end because the position of RB the injuries are a pretty high risk given they are in the middle of the pile, they are being bent backwards and rolled up on. Granted for every player age starts to effect but in the end even the RB you mentioned had to deal with some serious injuries.

 

[Bobhaze]

Jamal Anderson torn his ACL, Shawn Alexander 2006 broken left foot then the following season broken wrist. George continue to rush for 1,000 yards all the way until his 2nd to last year in football and his avg carry was never that great to begin with. Sorry injuries did play a part in these guys, it is not wear and tear they have 6 months off season the recover but in the end because the position of RB the injuries are a pretty high risk given they are in the middle of the pile, they are being bent backwards and rolled up on. Granted for every player age starts to effect but in the end even the RB you mentioned had to deal with some serious injuries.

I believe many of those injuries happened because of the load those guys had been carrying. I don’t think any of those injuries happened early in their careers. Cumulative load does play a big factor in injuries.

 

[Doomsday101]

I believe many of those injuries happened because of the load those guys had been carrying. I don’t think any of those injuries happened early in their careers. Cumulative load does play a big factor in injuries.

The longer you play the odds of taking on big injuries increase. I think the nature of the position leads itself to injuries. I'm not justifying Zeke contract what I do feel is the reason why guys like Emmitt and Payton maintained top performance over a long period of time is they were fortunate enough to avoid major injuries and maintained great conditioning

 

[LACowboysFan1]

On the subject of touches, Zeke is a bigger version of Emmitt, both are compact running backs. Emmitt had a ton of early carries also but he played a long time, the compact build helps him. Zeke might be the same, and also I think since he's slimmed down he has figured out, or the team figured it out for him, that if he continued to bang and bash into people instead of slipping tackles his career would be shorter. Think we'll see him do less of the banging and bashing and more cuts, etc.

But I might be wrong, and not ashamed to admit it...

 

[LACowboysFan1]

Agree his workload needs managed better, but it needs to be managed inside the 20's, not inside the red zone.

This is they first time ever I seen someone talk about number of carries in college. How about that be considered in every player then. I don't think that is a fair thing to use against Zeke for your case.

Anyone thinking the team planned to dump Zeke in a few years are just dreaming, and is probably a Zeke "disliker" as he will play most of his contract. He is not done by any means.
I never seen a fan base hate on so many players as we have here. The salary cap always works itself out, and is not a detriment as many think it is.

They blame his contract for the team not winning more games. Only natural I guess until you sit down and really think about it. Does anyone fault Zeke's effort, except for his coming out of games when there's nothing (apparently) wrong with him? (And maybe the coaches have told him to do that periodically to prolong his career, remember Landry didn't think Dorsett could hold up with lots of carries due to his size, but he played 11 yrs).

He plays very hard, maybe harder than he has to, but it's not like he pouts about how they use him (or don't use him) or constantly complains about things. He plays as well as he can, if the defense is atrocious as it is most years Zeke's been here or loses 3/5 of his o-line and has to run behind backups, and plays with backup quarterbacks, he still plays hard.

Zeke is NOT the issue with this team not winning more...

 

[MyFairLady]

The Zeke draft pick and contract is trending towards complete disaster. Highly unlikely he has an extended renaissance to save the situation. Just sunken costs at this point.

 

[conner01]

The FO just continues to prove the point that they don't know how to manage a football team. Zeke was a poor choice at #4 overall in the draft. We gave him a new contract with 2 years left on his rookie deal thus negating the upside of a first round contract. There is nothing special about him. He's as good as our offensive line.

RB is the very position you sign early in their contract if you plan to sign them
One could argue a RB is not worth a high pick or a second contract
But if you do a second contract you do it early so they can be moved on from younger

 

[RonWashington]

First of all…spoiler alert: I don’t hate Zeke. I appreciate his skills and all the yards he’s logged here. Ok? Just making that clear up front, lol.

Now on to two points I noticed recently involving Zeke that I think reflect poor decisions made by this FO with down the road consequences:

1. Did anyone notice his contract restructure? It may have fallen under the radar for some, but the Cowboys restructured Zeke’s contract, changing his $9.6 million in salary this year, and converts it to a signing bonus. It frees up some cap space, but it also has down the road consequences. It means if the Cowboys want to off load Zeke and his big salary the next two years, that just got harder because the converted salary to signing bonus makes his future cap hit higher than before. Not smart IMO.
   
   
2. Zeke’s huge workload history while garnering huge cap space is a problem. Zeke has had 1654 touches in his 5 years in the league, which already places him as 11th all time in touches in NFL history. That doesn’t count the 650 touches he had in 3 season at Ohio State. The guy has had about 2300 touches in 8 years. Some points on this:

• That is a TON of miles on those tire treads. RBs in NFL history with those kind of touch numbers ALL burnout early unless you’re Walter Payton or Emmitt Smith.
• With a reduced role, maybe Zeke could last a few years as an effective RB. But if they keep giving him the numbers they have for 5 years, he won’t be effective much longer.

Bottom line- I hope this contract restructure doesn’t bite this team’s cap in the posterior in the next two years. And if this front office is so committed to Zeke for 2-3 more seasons, they better get serious about some load management.

what’s the scenario if he goes for less then a 1000 yards in 2021 and Jerrah wants to move on in 2022 is it a huge cap hit ?

 

[Loso86]

First of all…spoiler alert: I don’t hate Zeke. I appreciate his skills and all the yards he’s logged here. Ok? Just making that clear up front, lol.

Now on to two points I noticed recently involving Zeke that I think reflect poor decisions made by this FO with down the road consequences:

1. Did anyone notice his contract restructure? It may have fallen under the radar for some, but the Cowboys restructured Zeke’s contract, changing his $9.6 million in salary this year, and converts it to a signing bonus. It frees up some cap space, but it also has down the road consequences. It means if the Cowboys want to off load Zeke and his big salary the next two years, that just got harder because the converted salary to signing bonus makes his future cap hit higher than before. Not smart IMO.
   
   
2. Zeke’s huge workload history while garnering huge cap space is a problem. Zeke has had 1654 touches in his 5 years in the league, which already places him as 11th all time in touches in NFL history. That doesn’t count the 650 touches he had in 3 season at Ohio State. The guy has had about 2300 touches in 8 years. Some points on this:

• That is a TON of miles on those tire treads. RBs in NFL history with those kind of touch numbers ALL burnout early unless you’re Walter Payton or Emmitt Smith.
• With a reduced role, maybe Zeke could last a few years as an effective RB. But if they keep giving him the numbers they have for 5 years, he won’t be effective much longer.

Bottom line- I hope this contract restructure doesn’t bite this team’s cap in the posterior in the next two years. And if this front office is so committed to Zeke for 2-3 more seasons, they better get serious about some load management.

Worried about Zeke should be worried about 77 and his restructure. At least 21 will be on the field

 

[beware_d-ware]

I saw this the other day as well, and thought it was a huge mistake. Zeke looks like a sharply declining player and a guy who you are thinking about cutting sooner rather than later. You want to keep the flexibility to do that open. Rolling his contract out is insane.

I thought the Cowboys were starting to get this after Dez's big second deal... they didn't roll his deal once he showed signs of obvious decline and were able to get out of it without a lot of dead money. Now we just double down on over the hill players.

 

[dmax]

According to Pro Football Reference, he is 98th all time in touches....

 

[Bobhaze]

According to Pro Football Reference, he is 98th all time in touches....

My understanding was that he was 11th most in touches for someone with five years in the league. I don’t mind being corrected if I’m wrong. My info was based on what I heard Norm Hitzges say on his show the other day.

 

[RonWashington]

My understanding was that he was 11th most in touches for someone with five years in the league. I don’t mind being corrected if I’m wrong. My info was based on what I heard Norm Hitzges say on his show the other day.

A lot of squads run the ball effectively by committee like SF in that SB run and Pete Carroll in Seattle . Our highly paid OC needs to come up with game plans that feature Pollard more and more and it would probably help Elliott in the long run stay fresh & healthy.

 

[Bobhaze]

They blame his contract for the team not winning more games. Only natural I guess until you sit down and really think about it. Does anyone fault Zeke's effort, except for his coming out of games when there's nothing (apparently) wrong with him? (And maybe the coaches have told him to do that periodically to prolong his career, remember Landry didn't think Dorsett could hold up with lots of carries due to his size, but he played 11 yrs).

He plays very hard, maybe harder than he has to, but it's not like he pouts about how they use him (or don't use him) or constantly complains about things. He plays as well as he can, if the defense is atrocious as it is most years Zeke's been here or loses 3/5 of his o-line and has to run behind backups, and plays with backup quarterbacks, he still plays hard.

Zeke is NOT the issue with this team not winning more...

Who is THEY? The original points of this thread were about Zeke’s contract restructure and his workload. My opinion is that the FO is problem…not Zeke. He’s overpaid (not his fault) and overused (not his fault). My other point is that having Zeke on this team has not made that much of a difference in the team’s playoff success, having only made the playoffs twice in his 5 years here. That also is not his fault.

This front office cannot seem to build the right roster around the talent they have assembled and decided to pay big bucks. That’s not Zeke or Dak or D-Law’s or any other big dollar star’s fault.

 

[CowboyRoy]

First of all…spoiler alert: I don’t hate Zeke. I appreciate his skills and all the yards he’s logged here. Ok? Just making that clear up front, lol.

Now on to two points I noticed recently involving Zeke that I think reflect poor decisions made by this FO with down the road consequences:

1. Did anyone notice his contract restructure? It may have fallen under the radar for some, but the Cowboys restructured Zeke’s contract, changing his $9.6 million in salary this year, and converts it to a signing bonus. It frees up some cap space, but it also has down the road consequences. It means if the Cowboys want to off load Zeke and his big salary the next two years, that just got harder because the converted salary to signing bonus makes his future cap hit higher than before. Not smart IMO.
   
   
2. Zeke’s huge workload history while garnering huge cap space is a problem. Zeke has had 1654 touches in his 5 years in the league, which already places him as 11th all time in touches in NFL history. That doesn’t count the 650 touches he had in 3 season at Ohio State. The guy has had about 2300 touches in 8 years. Some points on this:

• That is a TON of miles on those tire treads. RBs in NFL history with those kind of touch numbers ALL burnout early unless you’re Walter Payton or Emmitt Smith.
• With a reduced role, maybe Zeke could last a few years as an effective RB. But if they keep giving him the numbers they have for 5 years, he won’t be effective much longer.

Bottom line- I hope this contract restructure doesn’t bite this team’s cap in the posterior in the next two years. And if this front office is so committed to Zeke for 2-3 more seasons, they better get serious about some load management.

Everything they have done with Zeke has been stupid beginning with drafting him with our top 5 pick. I have no doubts they will continue to screw it up going forward.

 

[dmax]

My understanding was that he was 11th most in touches for someone with five years in the league. I don’t mind being corrected if I’m wrong. My info was based on what I heard Norm Hitzges say on his show the other day.

That's what I thought you meant, but it was a bit unclear in the OP. Didn't mean it to sound antagonistic. And I agree with your premise that workload bear watching. We can all hope he is more Emmitt and less Earl.

 

[LACowboysFan1]

QUOTE: Who is THEY? The original points of this thread were about Zeke’s contract restructure and his workload. My opinion is that the FO is problem…not Zeke. He’s overpaid (not his fault) and overused (not his fault). My other point is that having Zeke on this team has not made that much of a difference in the team’s playoff success, having only made the playoffs twice in his 5 years here. That also is not his fault.

This front office cannot seem to build the right roster around the talent they have assembled and decided to pay big bucks. That’s not Zeke or Dak or D-Law’s or any other big dollar star’s fault.QUOTE

The "they" I was referring to are posters here on this forum...