It felt like the entire stadium stopped breathing. Dak Prescott had pulled the Cowboys out of the rut to tie his team even with the Packers at 31 all. With 18 seconds left, it looked like overtime was calling. But then Aaron Rodgers happened. Rolling left, throwing across his body, and somehow finding Jared Cook tiptoeing down the sideline for 36 yards. Mason Crosby nailed the 51-yarder. 34-31. Just like that, Dak’s magical rookie season, a 13-3 NFC best, ended in heartbreak… and a cold dose of NFL reality.

That loss didn’t break him—it fueled him. “It’s definitely in our head,” Dak admitted the next season. “They knocked us out of the playoffs last year. I wouldn’t necessarily say it’s for revenge, but to go get a win, to show them what we’re capable of doing.” Since then, he’s made the playoffs five times, been an MVP candidate, and become the face of the franchise. But nearly a decade later, there’s still no Lombardi in Dallas. So, the question quietly lingers—is Dak Prescott really enough to hoist a Lombardi for the America’s team?

Enter Brice Butler, with a fresh perspective on this debate. “I do think he can take a team to the Super Bowl. I think he’s a leader enough to do so,” Butler explained while having a chat with Tyler Dunne on the Go Long TD Podcast. It sounds “disingenuous” to Butler that a quarterback is the reason why the team can’t make it to the Super Bowl. He argued, “When people look at me and go, ‘Dak is not good enough to take his team to the Super Bowl,” I’m like, ‘What quarterback in the NFL can take the Cowboys to the Super Bowl? Tell me.”

Butler pointed out that it’s the team culture and leadership, not just the quarterback, that determines the success of a team. He even said that Dak can take “a team” to the Super Bowl. But is it America’s Team? Well, that’s a million-dollar question. “Even if Pat Mahomes is the Dallas Cowboys quarterback and say Dak was in Kansas City. I’d say Dak goes to the Super Bowl at least one time and Pat doesn’t. I can honestly say that. Because it’s different dog. When you look at the organizations, I think we probably had these conversations, it’s bigger than football in Dallas.” This is what Butler’s argument was. It’s not on Dak if the team starts losing key pieces in key positions. 

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The decisions made by the Cowboys and their owner, Jerry Jones, are well-documented and have, time and again, come back to haunt them. Take Derrick Henry, for instance. The beast of a back wanted to play for the Cowboys last year when he was still a free agent. After all, he lives and trains in the Dallas area during the offseason. The catch?

“I thought it’d been some type of reach out, some type of talks or whatever. They never reached out,” Henry said last year. “… I don’t really know too much about their organization. All I know is what I hear.” By the time the 2024 season wrapped up, Henry rushed for almost 2,000 yards for Baltimore. Jerry Jones shed light on his decision not to sign Henry: “We couldn’t afford Derrick Henry,” he said. Of, course. The same thing happened with Saquon Barkley. Barkley revealed a few weeks ago that he was awaiting a response from Dallas. But the call never came. And the rest is history. So, it’s not just Dak Prescott—it’s the whole franchise. 

To put it plainly, Butler said: In Dallas, even the best quarterbacks would struggle. So, maybe that’s why he still believes Dak Prescott to be a championship-caliber QB… The only catch is him suiting for different team. How true is that? Guess we’ll never know. Sure, that doesn’t actually mean that Prescott is all clear here. It’s almost a decade now, and he’s yet to win a Super Bowl. “Yeah, I want to win a championship,” the soon-to-be-32 Dak said. But he could only hope for Jerry Jones’ business tactics to align with ‘that’ larger goal. Because right now…. They are kind of hurting the franchise in one way or another.

Dak Prescott’s Cowboys are bigger than football

When Jerry Jones loosened his purse strings by $150 million to buy the Cowboys over three decades ago, the franchise was bleeding money—losing $1 million a month. Fast forward to today, and the Cowboys are valued at over $10 billion. But this success isn’t just about football. It’s about branding, business savvy, and strategic sponsorships. After the 2023 season, Dallas pulled in an eye-popping $1.2 billion in revenue—$400 million more than the next closest team, the LA Rams.

And when you break it down, nearly $800 million of that came from local revenue—ticket sales, sponsorships, merchandise, and other team-specific streams, you name it. So, when Brice Butler said Dallas is “bigger than football,” he wasn’t just tossing around a hot take. “You’re in a situation to where if you don’t go to the Super Bowl? That star is still going to bring in 6 billion a year or whatever they bring in, and they’re not really tripping,” he explained.

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On the flip side, he added, “Other organizations, a lot of these owners out the way who let the business be the business, it’s like if you don’t make it, there’s a problem. If you don’t make it, your job is on the line.” The contrast is stark: while other teams are hoisting Lombardis, the Cowboys are cashing checks—even without postseason glory.

And that’s no accident. The Cowboys play at AT&T Stadium, owned by the city of Arlington but operated by Jerry Jones. The kicker? Jones turns it into a year-round money machine—hosting concerts, boxing, college football, and more. The result? Whether the Cowboys win or lose, revenue keeps climbing. Taken all together, Dak Prescott’s Cowboys and a Super Bowl this year? That’s a question that will hit the headlines in January 2026 whether they qualify or not. Whether it’s Dak’s job or not.