The Cost of the Playoffs

Matt Newhall

SPEX 660
Executive Summary

I recommend the Dallas Cowboys do not extend Dak Prescott prior to the 2021 season.

There are three big reasons for not extending Prescott which are limited cap space, inflated stats,

and a talented quarterback draft class.

Introduction

For my project, the data set I am using involves quarterback salary information, team

performance, and team salary cap information from the 2015-2019 seasons. I am interested in

researching if paying a quarterback, a top market deal will negatively affect team performance.

Overpaying a quarterback is an issue because the National Football League (NFL) has a hard

salary cap which limits the amount of money they have to spend on paying its players. The salary

cap increases in proportion to the NFL’s revenue for the previous year, so the salary cap has been

increasing year after year. The salary for the 2020 season was 198.2 million but will most likely

go down for the 2021 season due to the loss of revenue caused by COVID-19.

Methodology

To achieve the most accurate results I had to take the quarterback positional salary as a

percentage of the team’s salary cap because the salary cap increases year after year. Due to the

increasing salary cap it means quarterback salaries will also continue to rise which would skew

the results. I also had to use quarterback positional salary to account for teams who had

expensive backups. I thought the best metric to gauge success in the NFL was making the

playoffs because it allowed for a select group of teams to achieve success instead of just the
Superbowl winner. I decided that a head coach was tenured after three full seasons with a team to

allow time for the coaches to get the schemes and players they wanted into place.

Data

The data I used for my analysis included salary cap data acquired from Over The Cap, a

website that specializes in salary details for the NFL. I got the information about the playoff

appearances from Wikipedia. Lastly, I got the information about tenured head coaches from

ESPN.

Analysis

After using various metric analysis tools within Microsoft Excel, I noticed a few trends or

patterns. Firstly, there was no significant relationship between quarterback positional salary as a

percentage of the salary cap and team performance measured by playoff appearance. The average

quarterback positional salary as a percentage of the salary cap of teams that made the playoffs

was only .4% more than the average quarterback positional salary as a percentage of the salary

cap of the entire league. Secondly, there seemed to be a slight positive relationship between

having a tenured head coach and making the playoffs. At least six coaches make the playoffs

each season when they have been with their team for at least three full seasons. This means that

at least half of the coaches in the playoffs every year are tenured.
Recommendations

I recommend that the Dallas Cowboys do not extend Prescott next season because of

three reasons. The biggest reason is that they do not have very much salary cap space to work

with for the next two seasons. The salary cap will be below 25 million dollars at the current

salary cap, but it is likely to go down next year due to the loss of revenue from COVID. The next

reason is that Prescott does not perform as well as other top paid quarterbacks. Patrick Mahomes,

Russel Wilson, and Deshaun Watson are the top three highest paid quarterbacks by average

salary per year. Prescott does not play as well as these three even though he has a better

offensive line, receivers, and running back then Wilson and Watson. Prescott may have similar

stats but this is because the Cowboys are usually losing by numerous touchdowns in the fourth

quarter so they have no choice but to pass if they want to win. The final reason is that there are

three terrific quarterback prospects in this year's NFL draft. The Cowboys are currently 2-3 so

they could have a high draft pick in the draft along with having some draft capital to use to trade

up if needed.

Conclusion

It is in my best interest to recommend that Dak Prescott is either traded or released prior

to the 2021 season. My findings lead me to believe that the team is better off drafting a new

quarterback and keeping the coach to help with organizational stability. The main reasons for

releasing Prescott include salary cap issues, Prescott’s performance, and a talented quarterback

draft class.
 Bibliography

ESPN, www.espn.com/.

"NFL Playoff Results." Wikipedia,

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NFL_playoff_results#NFL_Divisional_Round_game_results_1970%E2%

80%93present.

Over The Cap, overthecap.com/.