It’s time to make final Super Bowl LIX predictions with the regular-season opener between the Kansas City Chiefs and Baltimore Ravens only two days away.
The MMQB staff will reveal its Super Bowl predictions on Wednesday, so I won’t spoil which two teams will make it to New Orleans from my playoff bracket. But I will provide a hint for this week’s Fact or Fiction by analyzing the Chiefs’ chances of becoming the first team in NFL history to win three consecutive Super Bowls.
Patrick Mahomes & Co., or the field for this season’s Super Bowl champion?
But before we answer that question, let’s take a look at Dak Prescott’s contract dilemma with the Dallas Cowboys.
Dak Prescott should halt contract negotiations with the Cowboys
Manzano’s view: Fact
There have been way too many discussions about whether the Cowboys should re-sign Prescott because of his postseason shortcomings.
Instead, with the regular season fast approaching, the focus should be whether one of the most productive quarterbacks since 2016 should commit to a franchise that hasn’t advanced to a Super Bowl this century.
There are multiple narratives for the latest QB contract standoff, but in reality, Prescott holds many advantages over the Cowboys. Prescott can either re-sign now with Dallas and become the highest-paid player in league history or wait six months and become the highest-paid player in league history for a different team.
Regardless of what you think of Prescott’s postseason failures, he plays quarterback and he does it very well. There will be at least one team out there willing to pay Prescott an absurd amount of money to play quarterback because the NFL can’t seem to find 32 reliable signal-callers.
This offseason proved that quarterbacks don’t need postseason success to break the bank. Jordan Love, Trevor Lawrence and Tua Tagovailoa all recently signed lucrative contract extensions with an annual average salary north of $53 million. The trio of QBs have two combined postseason wins. Prescott has a postseason record of 2–5.
Prescott and the Cowboys might be better off waiting to hammer out a new contract. Perhaps the pressure of playing for a new deal leads to Prescott taking the Cowboys deep in the playoffs, which would make negotiations smoother in the offseason.
Or maybe they’re due for a breakup, similar to Matthew Stafford and the Detroit Lions. That worked out well for both sides.
Chiefs will win three consecutive Super Bowls
Manzano’s view: Fiction
This is the grand question heading into the 2024 NFL season. Will the Chiefs become the first team in NFL history to win three consecutive Super Bowls?
It’s very difficult to complete the three-peat, as my colleague Matt Verderame found out in this must-read feature about what it takes to climb the mountain in three consecutive seasons.
Darren Woodson, the former standout safety for the Cowboys, told Verderame that there needs to be a collective mindset of wanting to be the first team to achieve this feat, while also putting aside the wear and tear and mental burdens from the two previous “long-ass seasons.” Woodson’s Cowboys fell short in the 1994 NFC title game against the San Francisco 49ers after winning back-to-back Super Bowls.
It appears the Chiefs have the right mindset because there wasn’t much chatter about Travis Kelce retiring after they defeated the 49ers in Super Bowl LVIII in Las Vegas. Also, the team prioritized Chris Jones’s monster contract extension in the offseason to ensure the stars of the band are back to chase history.
But putting aside the “long-ass seasons” will be a daunting challenge in a competitive AFC. The Buffalo Bills and Baltimore Ravens have hunger on their side as two teams that have had their hearts broken in the postseason at the expense of the Chiefs. The Houston Texans are on the rise with a loaded roster, and the New York Jets can be dangerous if Aaron Rodgers stays healthy. And the same with the Cincinnati Bengals if Joe Burrow stays healthy.
It’s hard to bet against the Chiefs, who will field another talented roster. But I’m taking the field on this one.
The 49ers won the contract standoff with Brandon Aiyuk
Manzano’s view: Fiction
Let’s call this one a tie. It’s really a win for both sides that they managed to work out a deal after Aiyuk was nearly traded multiple times in the past month. They agreed to a four-year, $120 million contract extension.
Aiyuk didn’t match the contracts of Justin Jefferson, CeeDee Lamb and A.J. Brown, but he still made the $30 million-per-year club for wide receivers. He’s also well-positioned for individual and team success for years to come as a member of the 49ers. Aiyuk could have gotten more money playing for the New England Patriots had he accepted their offer, but they might be years away from being a playoff team.
As for the 49ers, the headaches of these messy contract negotiations that occasionally became public on social media ended up being worth it because they didn’t overpay for Aiyuk. Unlike the quarterback market that’s dictated by who’s next in line, the 49ers managed to pay Aiyuk in terms of where he ranks among the best wideouts in the league. He’s an exceptional route runner and vital for Brock Purdy, but he’s not better than Jefferson, Lamb and Brown.
The 49ers called Aiyuk’s bluff and assumed that he wanted to remain in San Francisco and not play in New England, Pittsburgh or Cleveland. With the regular season around the corner, Aiyuk likely realized that he wasn’t going to get more from the 49ers and decided to take a very good offer that was on the table.
It’s like most job negotiations. You ask for more because it doesn’t hurt to try knowing in the back of your mind the offer on the table is good enough to accept. It didn’t work out for Aiyuk, but he probably still got what he wanted.
Aiyuk is a better WR than Amon-Ra St. Brown
Manzano’s view: Fiction
Aiyuk’s new four-year, $120 million deal is essentially the same as the extension Amon-Ra St. Brown received from the Detroit Lions a few months ago. St. Brown got the same years and total money as Aiyuk, but his $77 million in guaranteed money is $1 million more than what Aiyuk got.
That’s below what the big three got in guaranteed money, with Jefferson ($110 million), Lamb ($100 million) and Brown ($84 million). Tyreek Hill’s revised deal bumped up his guaranteed money to $106 million.
Judging from the guaranteed money and yearly salaries, it appears that NFL GMs created a positional ranking for how to pay their respective star receivers. The 49ers got it right after paying Aiyuk a little below St. Brown, who’s been more consistent in his career. Aiyuk, a 2020 first-round pick, had somewhat of a slow start to his career before his dominant ’23 season.
Also, it’s fair to argue that Aiyuk and St. Brown are better receivers than DJ Moore and Jaylen Waddle. Both recently got contract extensions that average around $28 million per year, although Moore received $82 million guaranteed.
Eventually, Ja’Marr Chase will cash in with the Cincinnati Bengals, and if they’re going off this somewhat positional ranking, Chase might get paid top-three money, similar to what Jefferson and Lamb received.
Perhaps Davante Adams will soon get a revised deal—if he’s willing to commit to the Las Vegas Raiders—because his $65.7 million in guaranteed money that he received from his 2022 deal has quickly become outdated after all the receiver deals that took place in the past few months.
Dolphins made the right move to re-sign Mike McDaniel
Manzano’s view: Fact
This was a no-brainer for the Dolphins after they locked up their core group of Tagovailoa, Hill and Waddle this offseason. Coach Mike McDaniel has brought out the best in those three players the past two seasons, leading to an easy decision for Miami to re-sign him now, despite having two seasons left on his original deal.
Sure, McDaniel, who’s now signed through the 2028 season, still has plenty to prove, with an 0–2 postseason record and few wins against teams with winning records. But turning the Dolphins into one of the best offenses in the league is an impressive feat for a franchise that has struggled to find consistency since Dan Marino retired in 2000.
Once the Dolphins paid their core group, it was only a matter of time before they committed to the mastermind behind the recent success. Miami is clearly committed to seeing this through with McDaniel and Tagovailoa running the show.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as NFL Fact or Fiction: Dak Prescott Should Halt Contract Negotiations With the Cowboys.
