Mo Claiborne will be collecting his Kansas City Chiefs Super Bowl ring soon enough, and even as a backup, that comes as a shock to Cowboys fans who remember him mostly as a colossal bust as a first-round pick in 2012. In five injury-plagued seasons (he missed 33 games), the former LSU cornerback made four interceptions for Dallas.

That brings us to the strange case of Byron Jones, and pardon me while I speak from both sides of my mouth. I have never completely bought into the analytically-driven arguments that say he’s one of the league’s best cornerbacks. With two interceptions in five seasons, while missing only one game at safety or corner, I don’t think Jones is the best anything around the league, but he’s surely the best defensive back the Cowboys happen to have.

And I’m not sure they can afford to lose him. I’m almost certain they will.

The daily focus around here -- and it seems on national sports talk shows as well -- is Dak Prescott’s contract or, I suppose, his lack of one. Wide receiver Amari Cooper comes up next, and not just in the media’s pecking order. In speaking to reporters last week, Cowboys executive vice president Stephen Jones said, “Dak, in terms of the money we spend there, and Amari, and then see kind of what we got left and where we want to allocate it.”

Understanding that the club was able to prioritize defense a year ago, at least in terms of arriving at new deals with DeMarcus Lawrence and Jaylon Smith, it’s also clear that the money that has favored the offense will only tilt stronger in its favor in 2020.

Start with these facts. The Cowboys ranked ninth in offensive spending even while they were 32nd in quarterback spending (figures from OverTheCap.com). That comes largely from spending more money than any team — by a significant margin — on the offensive line. The Cowboys spent $15 million more than the 49ers and $22 million more than the Chiefs in that department. When Prescott’s deal goes from $2 million to a minimum of $27 million on the non-exclusive franchise tag, the Cowboys will compete for No. 1 in offensive spending.

Dallas has always lagged behind in what it’s willing to pay the secondary. You’ve got to save somewhere, and this is the place the Cowboys choose. Only the Giants, Tampa Bay and Carolina spent less than the $17 million the Cowboys paid their defensive backs. Subtract Jones from the mix and you have Chidobe Awuzie and Jourdan Lewis as your top two corners (Anthony Brown is a free agent, too) and Xavier Woods as your top safety with Jeff Heath also being unrestricted.

It’s one thing to say that’s where the team needs to spend its draft capital, but it’s another to think that that answer solves anything for 2020. The Cowboys went this direction in 2017 with Colorado’s Awuzie in the second and Michigan’s Lewis in the third and Louisiana Tech’s Woods in the fifth. I’m not sure anyone has a good answer three years later as to who those players are and what they’re going to be.

It’s entirely possible the Cowboys lose their sack leader from 2019 (Robert Quinn is a free agent) and their top defensive back (Jones) while wrestling with real concerns over linebacker Leighton Vander Esch’s long-term viability due to his cervical spinal stenosis condition. This sounds more like a defense in complete overhaul than a unit that is ready to support a No. 1-ranked offense on some sort of playoff run under new head coach Mike McCarthy.

As for the notion that Dallas will benefit from a soft schedule — opponents’ 2019 win percentage ranks theirs 30th of 32 — I would advise one to tread lightly here, especially where the Dallas defense is concerned. The most important thing is that any number of NFL teams change radically from year to year.

Beyond that, it’s hard to look at the 10 opponents outside the NFC East and say this looks like a cakewalk. If you already know the Cowboys ranked No. 1 in total offense, consider then that Baltimore was No. 2, San Francisco was No. 4, Atlanta No. 5, the Rams No. 7 and Seattle No. 8. The Cowboys play all of those folks with three of those games on the road.

It’s fair to guess that Kyler Murray and Kliff Kingsbury in Year 2 will be more of a handful, Cleveland should bounce back after a disastrous season and Pittsburgh presumably gets a bump from Ben Roethlisberger’s return. Cincinnati will change its identity if LSU’s Joe Burrow is throwing to its solid core of receivers. So be careful with those low-ranked offenses and poor records when figuring what this Cowboys defense is up against. If you want to derive meaning from 2019 records, outside the NFC East, the Cowboys were a 3-7 team.

There’s little disputing here that Prescott and Cooper need to get paid although the manner for doing so is up for debate. Either way, it leaves a strained defense out in the cold — one that’s oddly capable of missing a defensive back who almost never makes big plays.

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