DeMarco Murray said goodbye to the only NFL team that he had ever known a few weeks ago when he signed a free agent contract with the Philadelphia Eagles. The Dallas Cowboys were unwilling to match Philadelphia's offer, which makes Murray one of the highest-paid running backs in the NFL.

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Murray maintained throughout the negotiations that he would have preferred to stay in Dallas, and even said he would be willing to listen to an offer from the team right up until the last minute. No such offer materialized, so Murray left town.

According to CBS Sports, he may have also taken a different approach to staying with the Cowboys prior to signing his new deal with a division rival, as he apparently went up to quarterback Tony Romo and requested that the Dallas signal-caller take a pay cut.

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"DeMarco ended up asking me, 'Why don't you take a pay cut?' I said, 'I will. I would take a pay cut to go do this,'" Romo said. "I was like, 'They're going to restructure me.' That's the same thing in some ways, just for the salary cap purposes. He was like, 'OK, now we're back to being friends again.' I would take $5 million less if meant getting him back."

"He knew that. It was just funny how he was literally worried about that part of it for a week. I'm like, 'That's not the reason.' I'm like, 'Obviously I'll restructure. I would even take a pay cut.' He was like, 'OK, we can be friends again.' It's amazing what you think about in those moments."