FRISCO - How can one blame Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott for getting a bit emotional as he discussed this week here inside The Star his return to health after 2024's lost season?
The oft-injured star - yes, "oft-injured'' unfortunately now fits - will be entering his 10th NFL season in a hopefully healthy way ... and a rebooted way, too.
He's got a new head coach in Brian Schottenheimer. He's got a new top receivers duo with George Pickens joining CeeDee Lamb. On a personal level, he's a family man.
Now he just needs to look as ready and as smooth as he did in Tuesday's OTA workouts. And, as he'll turn 32 at training camp in Oxnard, he needs to do it over the course of 17 games.
"He looks good," Schottenheimer told us. "You guys will see him out there .... He's doing his normal stuff. He's getting most of the work with the ones. We're rolling some guys through there but you'll see him.
"He looks good. I think he's progressing nicely."
Last season, Prescott exited in Week 9 against Atlanta and was ruled out for the year and underwent season-ending surgery for a torn hamstring. In part as a result, Dallas finished the 2024 campaign at a dismal 7-10.
The three-time Pro Bowl quarterback's availability this year is part of the fix.
"I pretty much can do it all," Prescott said of him being cleared for everything but full-contact football. "Feel good. Yeah, I think I'm just not cleared for contact, which we've got a while for that anyways. Yeah, I'm out there in the team activities, feel good. Just trying to stay that way. Yeah, feeling great."
And how is he feeling emotionally in regard to that "lost season''?
"I mean (expletive), I was hurt," Prescott said frankly. "Sorry for the language, but my offseason started way earlier, so that's really essentially why I'm ahead (of schedule.)''
Dak's personal goal was to be ready to participate in OTAs at some level.
That is happening.
Ultimately, there is a much larger target to be hit, of course.
In part because the oddity of his $60 million APY salary makes him the highest-paid player in the history of the NFL, there are expectations. That means the playoffs should be attainable. That means winning playoff games should be doable.
That path starts in earnest in September when Prescott will lead Dallas as it opens the NFL's 2025 season at the Super Bowl champion Eagles in Philadelphia.
And maybe some reflection on the past - with more emotion - will aide the future.
"It's amazing how fast it happens,'' Prescott said of being in his 10th season. "There's reflection here and there, especially, when you're injured at the time that I was injured, as long as I was injured. ... There was time for that reflection. And yeah, it just makes you that more humble, that much more hungry and blessed.''
Want more Cowboys? Come inside the Fish Report!