Entering the 2020 season, most would agree the Dallas Cowboys’ Super Bowl window is as wide as can be. They’ve got a plethora of young talent on long term contracts, and have potentially top tier playmakers like Michael Gallup and CeeDee Lamb on the cheapest contracts of their career.

The time is now in Dallas, but the future feels pretty bright too.

The same can’t be said for veteran linebacker Sean Lee. A key leader on the Cowboys defense for almost a decade, Lee will turn 34 in just a few weeks. And he knows the end of his football career is near.

As Matthew Lenix wrote about earlier this week, Lee gave some interesting quotes to ESPN’s Todd Archer around his age, his place on the team, and his preparation for the upcoming season despite the ongoing global pandemic.

“You feel like the old man when you realize some of these mid-, late-’90s birthdays of the guys you’re playing with” – Sean Lee.

Once the best player on the Cowboys defense, Sean Lee has been forced to take a backseat to both Jaylon Smith and Leighton Vander Esch. The two young linebackers took the league by storm in 2018, leaving Lee to fight for snaps in base packages and fill in when needed due to injury.

Both Smith and Vander Esch had up-and-down 2019 campaigns, though, and Lee capitalized famously during their week 15 matchup with the Los Angeles Rams.

Sean Lee is clearly still respected in the locker room, and as cliche as it sounds, he is in some ways a player-coach for the Dallas defense. He, like the rest of the Cowboys, is being forced to adjust to a brand new coaching staff during this strange offseason in which they’ve yet to have any face to face meetings or practices.

Only making his final run towards a Super Bowl ring that much more complicated.