Dallas Cowboys 2026 Free Agency Tracker: Updated signings, rumors

Updated March 9, 2026, 11:40 a.m. CT

• Here’s an up-to-date accounting of the Cowboys offseason. Top transactions will be here, with more details below.
• Cowboys trading 2027 4th-round pick for edge Rashan Gary.
• Cowboys restructuring RT Terence Steele
• Cowboys restructuring Safety Malik Hooker

The Dallas Cowboys are switching some things up in 2026. After missing the playoffs for the second-straight season, the team has not only hired a new defensive coordinator, but they are switching schemes with the change. First-time head coach Brian Schottenheimer had the Dallas offense humming behind QB Dak Prescott, but he was forced to work with Matt Eberflus as DC, and that went horribly.

Enter Christian Parker, an exciting young rising star who will transform Dallas to a base 3-4 defense. Along with the Jones family vowing to spend money in this year’s free agency, fans are cautiously optimistic this will be a much more exciting spring than any over the last decade.

Here, we’ll keep track of every coming and going, every rumor of potential interest that may or may not work out, and the contract details associated with each transaction. And as always, we’ll continuously update the comp pick ledger; which, if Dallas does spend heavy, will likely end up with no comp picks for the first time in forever.

Cowboys Rumor Mill

Expert NFL picks: Exclusive betting insights only at USA TODAY.

Potential Targets signing elsewhere

• CB Asante Samuel returns to the Pittsburgh Steelers
• Raiders acquire CB Taron Johnson from Bills for Day 3 pick swap
• Jaguars re-sign CB Montaric Brown
• Colts sign WR Alec Pierce, second best WR free agent behind tagged Pickens, for $28.5M per
• CB Jaylon Watson leaves KC to sign with Chiefs

Cowboys 2026 Signings and Departures Remaining Cowboys Free Agents

• There are only 32 compensatory picks available to be spread out amongst the 32 franchises, but they are not distributed equally. Also, no team can receive more than four compensatory picks in any one draft.
• The picks are distributed across the third through seventh rounds, at the conclusion of the standard 32 picks of each round. Picks are not evenly distributed throughout these rounds, but rather done by a sliding cutoff scale.
• For each player a team signs, it cancels out a player that team lost. These are canceled out based on the value of the contracts. If a team loses a player valued as a third-round pick, and a player valued as a fifth round pick, but sign a player who’s valued as a third… then the team gets the fifth-round pick compensation. The third-round picks cancel out. However, if they sign a player who’s valued as a fourth, then he would cancel out the lower player, and said team would get compensated with the third-round pick.
• On top of salary concerns, not every free agent signed or lost qualifies for compensatory consideration. There are ways to sign players that won’t add to the “players signed” ledger. Players who are cut from other teams, players who were RFAs or ERFAs who weren’t tendered, players signed after “May 12th” (specific date will vary year-to-year).
• The primary determining factor of which round a team is compensated with for a lost player is the Adjusted Average Annual Value of that player’s deal with his new team, compared to the rest of the league. There are levels associated with each round of compensation and teams are slotted in order within those rounds based on the rankings. Playing time and postseason awards are factored in at a much lesser weight. See Over The Cap’s active tracker of where values of each new contract slot.
• The player must stay with his new team through Week 10 of the next season to qualify.
• Occasionally, teams will be awarded “net value” comp picks, which is where the volume of QFA lost and signed evens out, but the difference in quality of players is so severe the team still earns an extra selection.

Multiple players cannot be rolled into a higher compensatory. For instance, Dallas having 5 players with the last two being 6th round comps, will not move it to a 5th rounder.