Troy Aikman celebrated his girlfriend Marisa Howard’s birthday with a romantic date night in Dallas and shared rare photos of the couple on Instagram on Sunday.The former Cowboys quarterback, who now earns $18 million-a-year as ESPN’s lead NFL color commentator, took Marisa to Catch for her 40th birthday. The picture shows Aikman with his arm around his girlfriend, who is 19 years younger than him. The Instagram story was captioned: ‘Best night.’ Earlier on Sunday, Aikman posted three photos of Marisa, a yogi and children’s author, to his Instagram and captioned the post: ‘Happy Birthday Beautiful.’The couple made their relationship public earlier this year when Aikman shared photos of them from a trip to Croatia with his two daughters, Alexa and Jordan, back in June.Their romance was first reported by D Magazine in June 2025 after Aikman and Howard were spotted taking hot yoga classes together in Dallas. Troy Aikman posted a picture of his girlfriend Marisa as they shared a romantic birthday dinner The former Cowboys quarterback also posted several pictures of Marisa on her 40th birthday The couple went public in June when they went to Croatia with Aikman’s two daughtersD Magazine reported at the time that Howard was still legally married to her ex-husband after she filed for divorce from Frank Howard Jr. in July 2024.She reportedly worked as the director of communications and media at Howard Jr.’s molecular diagnostic testing laboratory GeneIQ. The former couple also share two daughters.Aikman was first married to former Cowboys publicist Rhonda Worthey before they split in January 2011. He then married Catherine ‘Capa’ Mooty in 2017 but their divorce was finalized in July 2024. It comes after Aikman admitted last month he’s ‘had no conversations’ with ESPN regarding his future, despite colleague Joe Buck signing a massive new deal. Buck recently agreed a deal to continue as the voice of ‘Monday Night Football’ into the 2030s. According to The Athletic, his annual salary is rising from $15 million to $18 million in the massive deal worth $108 million in total.Buck, 57, and Aikman, 59, have been together in the booth since 2002 and left Fox together to join ESPN in 2022. They will be behind the mic as the network hosts the Super Bowl for the first time at the end of this season.But beyond that, three-time Super Bowl champion Aikman’s future is unclear. His five-year, $90 million contract ends after this season, and he has acknowledged he has not discussed what happens next with his bosses. ‘I thought something would be done prior to the start of this season,’ Aikman said on the Sports Media with Richard Deitsch podcast that was released on Sunday.’I’ve never gone into a last year of a contract ever since I signed with the Dallas Cowboys. So I thought that it would be done. It’s not. ‘When it might get done, if it gets done, is anybody’s guess, and it’s just not something that I’m really putting a lot of energy into.’ Aikman recently admitted he hasn’t had any conversations with ESPN over a new contractAikman said there is ‘no question’ working with Buck is a factor in his future and he would love to continue knowing his partner’s role is secured. ‘How much of that is my decision, I guess is yet to be determined,’ Aikman added. ‘Would I like to continue working with Joe Buck moving down the road? 100 percent.’Despite news of Buck’s new contract being made public, ESPN has declined to comment on specifics, insisting full focus is on this year’s historic Super Bowl broadcast. ‘With this historic season for ESPN now underway, our entire focus is on bringing fans the best possible football coverage, culminating with our first Super Bowl,’ ESPN executive vice president of communications, Josh Krulewitz, said.’To that end, we won’t be addressing talent contract specifics publicly before the Super Bowl.’