Should the Cowboys be Worried George Pickens Hasn’t Signed His Contract Yet?

George Pickens has not signed his tender with the Dallas Cowboys, Todd Archer of ESPN reported, and Rich spent Monday's segment turning over the possible reasons a wide receiver who cannot be traded or play without a signature is letting the paperwork sit.

"I thought it was done," Rich said when Chris Brockman surfaced the news. The mechanics, as Rich laid them out, are unforgiving. Pickens cannot be dealt unless the tender is signed. Pickens cannot suit up unless the tender is signed. And the long-term-deal off-ramp the Cowboys could theoretically use to convert the tender into a contract has a hard expiration. "You can't do that after June fifteenth," Rich said.

From there the show worked the suspect list. Pickens could simply be on vacation, which sent Rich into a story about faxing his first NFL Network contract from Venice on his honeymoon while Suzy napped. DocuSign now exists, Brockman noted, foreclosing the geography excuse.

The more substantive theories landed on leverage and on the Cowboys' own news cycle. Stephen Jones has said publicly that Pickens is playing on the tender, which Rich treated as either a fact or a negotiating position depending on the day. If Pickens and his camp want a trade, refusing to sign is the cleanest way to steer destination. "If they do want to trade him, they might be like, we don't want to go to that team, so we're not being traded until we sign this thing," Rich said. "Find the team we want. And the team that we want isn't going to be signing my guy to a contract that's long-term to our liking. So we're not signing the tender."

The other theory was pure Dallas. The Cowboys, Rich suggested, benefit from being the lead item on a Monday morning regardless of what the item is. "Or the most likely scenario is we keep the Cowboys name in the news because that's what," Rich trailed off, before Brockman finished the thought with Jerry Jones telling Pickens not to sign. "Would it surprise you?" Rich asked. Nobody on set said yes.

The show landed on no answer, which is the honest answer. Pickens has options that look like leverage, the Cowboys have a calendar that runs to mid-June, and a tender sitting unsigned is, as Rich put it, notable. "I don't like this right now," TJ Jefferson said, closing the loop on a story that the Cowboys, by design or by accident, are once again leading the news week with.