The deadline has passed for teams to submit offer sheets for Cowboys restricted free agent kicker Brandon Aubrey, closing off the last outside path to pry him away from Dallas for now.
Aubrey can still sign his one-year, $5.76 million tender, work out a long-term extension with the Cowboys or be traded by Dallas, but the offer-sheet window is gone.
The timing matters because Aubrey has become one of the NFL’s most productive kickers in a short span. He earned a Pro Bowl nod in each of his first three years with the Cowboys and became the first kicker in franchise history to make three consecutive Pro Bowls. For his career, Aubrey has made 112 of 127 field goal attempts for an 88.2% success rate. In 2025, he made three 60-plus-yard field goals, the most in a single NFL season. He also hit three 50-plus-yard field goals against the Lions, the first player in league history to do that in one game, and became the first kicker in NFL history with 10 or more 50-plus-yard makes in three seasons.
Aubrey became a restricted free agent after his third season with the Cowboys in 2025, and Dallas officially placed the second-round tender on him March 7. That tender gives the team control over his immediate future while leaving the sides room to keep negotiating. Aubrey said March 11 that the talks were in a “waiting pattern,” adding, “Obviously, Dallas is my home,” and, “I’d like to keep it that way, so it would be nice to get a long-term deal going. Just need to sit down and have that conversation.”
Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said March 31 at the NFL Owners Meetings in Phoenix, Arizona, that he was satisfied with Aubrey playing on the tender for the 2026 season, while adding that the club would still look for a long-term deal. Stephen Jones described the talks at the NFL Combine as “a journey.” If Aubrey meets the necessary requirements for an accrued season and does not sign a long-term deal before then, he will pick up his fourth accrued season following 2026 and become an unrestricted free agent next offseason. If he reports to training camp and plays in at least six regular-season games, he can reach another accrued season after 2026 and hit the open market the next year.
For Dallas, the deadline removes outside pressure but not the bigger question. Aubrey remains under team control, and the Cowboys still have to decide whether a one-year hold serves them better than locking up one of the league’s most reliable kickers for longer.
