NFL Free Agency 2020: Best landing spot for top 20 players

Amari Cooper will most likely return to the Dallas Cowboys in 2020 after playing out the team option year in his rookie deal. Cooper, by all accounts, wants to be back, telling NFL Network’s Jane Slater he’d like to be in Dallas for a long time.

Cowboys vice president Stephen Jones said he’s making the retention of Cooper, as well as quarterback Dak Prescott, top priorities, even if that means other free agents will have to be sent on their way — looking at you, Byron Jones.

In Cooper’s first full season in Dallas, he was a Pro Bowler for the second consecutive year, catching 79 balls on 119 targets for career-highs of 1,189 yards and eight touchdowns. It was the fourth Pro Bowl nod in five seasons for the former No. 4 overall draft pick, selected by Oakland in the 2015 NFL Draft.

In a Week 5 loss at home to the Packers, Cooper caught 11 passes for a career-high 226 yards and a touchdown, posting the 12th 200-yard receiving game in Cowboys’ history in the process. If was the first 200-yard game by a Dallas receiver since … Amari Cooper had 217 yards in a Dec. 9, 2018, victory over the Eagles.

It was the fourth-highest single-game total in team history, topped only by Miles Austin (250 yards on 10 catches at Kansas City in 2009), Hall of Famer Bob Hayes (246 yards on nine grabs at Washington in 1966) and Frank Clarke (251 yards on 10 receptions against the Redskins in 1962).

Cooper has caught 132 passes in just 25 games since coming to the Cowboys in an October 2018 trade for Dallas’ 2019 first-round pick. He was eighth in the NFL in receiving yards last season and ninth in touchdown catches.