INDIANAPOLIS ?? Dallas Cowboys executive vice president Stephen Jones said this week the team wants to give quarterback Tony Romo a contract extension.
Cowboys coach Jason Garrett realizes it's not as simple as writing a fat check.
"There's math involved in the deal and everybody's got to get under the cap and a number of teams are making these kinds of decisions," Garrett told news reporters Friday at the NFL scouting combine. "We do have an opportunity to restructure Tony's contract. We believe really strongly in Tony Romo as our quarterback. We want to make sure we get that business done to help our football team be as good as it can be.
"I do believe we have to address some things with personnel and freeing up some of that money to allow us to do that."
The Cowboys were $21.3 million over the salary cap earlier this week, according to figures obtained by USA TODAY Sports.
Cornerback Brandon Carr, wide receiver Miles Austin and offensive tackle Doug Free have big contracts that could be restructured to make room for an extension for Romo, who is scheduled to be a free agent after the 2013 season. Romo is slated to earn a base salary of $11.5 million this year.
Jones wants Romo to be the Cowboys' quarterback "for the next four to five years." Garrett, a quarterback in the NFL to the age of 34, believes that's doable.
"I think Tony's a young player," Garrett said. "He's 32 now, but if you remember, he didn't play his first three or four years at all. He's been a starter for six years and he has a lot of football in front of him. If you watch him play, you see a young player, a guy who can move, a guy who the ball really jumps out of his hand, he's very spontaneous as a player. You see no signs of him getting old as a player so you feel good about him for a long time to come."
With a grin, Garrett added, "But the way we work around here is we focus on today, this year, so we're much more short-term thinking in what our attention is."
Right before that, Garrett was asked if it's time for the team to start working on developing a quarterback for the long term as Romo's eventual replacement. He didn't say no and he didn't say yes.
"That's always important, but you only have so many resources and you want to make sure you use them wisely," he said. "We believe in the quarterback position. We think it's really, really important. I think our track record suggests that. At the same time, we have other issues on our football team. So at every turn, we'll try to take the best player, the players that can help us now but also help us in the future.
"We're certainly open to that but we're early on in this whole evaluation process."
Copyright 2013 USATODAY.com
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