Trade Scenario: Cowboys WR Amari Cooper for Ravens CB Marcus Peters
FRISCO - At some point in the next three weeks — as Amari Cooper's $20 million salary becomes fully guaranteed on March 21 barring a change — the Dallas Cowboys will make the tough call.
How worse-off are we without our best receiver?
How much do we need $16 million of cap room?
Would Cooper renegotiate his deal to stay here?
Without a new price tag, how much better off are we trading him rather than cutting him?
Given that the savings in a cut and trade are the same $16 million if Dallas comes to grips with a goodbye to Cooper, it obviously should explore a trade.
One media suggestion is a fascinating one:
How about the Cowboys exchanging four-time Pro Bowl wide receiver Cooper for Baltimore Ravens four-time All-Pro cornerback Marcus Peters?
As a sidebar, it so happens that Cooper and Peters don't like each other. Remember?
Anyway, Bleacher Report is among the many outlets that have tossed out blockbuster ideas involving Cooper.
And it's worth digging into here ...
*B/R writes: "The Baltimore Ravens could use a proven No. 1 receiver.''
“I don’t make those decisions,” Amari says of returning to Dallas. “I honestly don’t know, but hopefully.”
We're not sure that's true; the Ravens have expressed satisfaction with their group. But maybe.
Also See: Marcus Peters Will Be Ready for Season, Ravens Want to Retain Him
*B/R says "the deal makes financial sense for both teams.'' And here is an interesting wrinkle here, with B/R suggesting "Dallas could ... work out an extension that would soften (Peters') $10 million cap hit and still have money to put toward retaining (Michael) Gallup or (Ced) Wilson."
Peters is 29 and under contract for one more year. So locking him up long-term is fine. But he's also a $12 mil APY corner. Why does Dallas need to do that when it just in the last two drafts picked three corners? Isn't the plan to have Trevon Diggs on one side and Kelvin Joseph - making $2 million APY on the other?
Ravens GM Eric DeCosta, however, said recently that he "loves" Peters and expects him to be on the team in 2022.
*B/R sort of skips over the fact that Peters missed all 2021 after sustaining a torn ACL in the preseason, and won't be back on the field until training camp - a risk for anybody trading for him.
*B/R also skips over the fact that these two teams greatly value picks. This proposal calls for the Ravens to part with a third-rounder; we bet they wouldn't do that.
It also ignores a core value of the Cowboys': Here's betting that a Dallas trade scenario featuring Amari Cooper would be not for another expensive player, but rather for picks.
— Mike Fisher - as a newspaper beat writer and columnist and on radio and TV, where he is an Emmy winner - has covered the NFL since 1983 and the Dallas Cowboys since 1990. He is the author of two best-selling books on the Cowboys and is the Cowboys 'insider' as a radio personality on the team's flagship station 105.3 The Fan.
