The Dallas Cowboys are a bad football team, and they are about to be an even worse one for the foreseeable future, as starting quarterback Dak Prescott is expected to miss multiple weeks with a hamstring injury suffered during the team's Week 9 loss to the Atlanta Falcons. Star wideout CeeDee Lamb also suffered a sprained AC joint in his shoulder during the game, and he is considered week to week.
Their season is going nowhere, fast. Consider that we wrote this about the Cowboys before they were blown out by the Falcons and lost their star quarterback and potentially their star receiver to injuries:
They do not do anything well: Their pass offense is not efficient and their run game is non-existent. They cannot stop the run and teams can throw the ball to wherever they want.
They are tied for 24th in the NFL in point differential. Two of their three wins have come against teams (Browns, Giants) that are otherwise a combined 2-10 on the season, and two of their three wins (Giants, Steelers) have come by a combined eight points. They were blown out by the Saints and Lions, and blown out for the significant majority of their losses to the Ravens and 49ers before cutting them down to one score in garbage time.
Along with the decrepit Carolina Panthers and New England Patriots, they are one of only three teams ranked inside the bottom 10 in EPA per play on both offense and defense, according to Tru Media. In other words, they are not a good football team. And in more ways than one.
After Sunday's loss, all of those figures are even worse. And they will be without Prescott for multiple weeks, and potentially without Lamb as well. Micah Parsons, Demarcus Lawrence and Daron Bland remain sidelined, as does Brandin Cooks. There is very little hope on the horizon. Given the team's massive defensive issues, how bad the offense has been even with Prescott at the helm, and that Cooper Rush's performance filling in for Prescott in 2022 was more mirage than real, it's likely the Cowboys are going to sink even further in the standings over the next few weeks.
It follows, then, that the Cowboys should look to be sellers ahead of Tuesday's trade deadline, rather than buyers -- no matter what Jerry Jones said immediately following the team's defeat at the hands of the Falcons. The issue there, though, is that they simply don't have that many players who would make for attractive trade targets.
The most likely candidates are probably defensive tackle Osa Odighizuwa, who is in the final year of his rookie contract and seemingly unlikely to be re-signed given Dallas' other financial commitments and recent refusal to open up cap space to pay anyone other than the team's top-flight stars; and slot corner Jourdan Lewis, who is on a one-year deal and can help a team in need of interior pass coverage and feisty run defense from the slot. Other players are either definitely not available (Prescott, Lamb, Parsons, Lawrence, Bland, Trevon Diggs, Zack Martin, Tyler Smith, any of the rookies) or else not good enough at this point to attract offers (Mazi Smith, Eric Kendricks, Malik Hooker, Donovan Wilson, Terence Steele, Brandin Cooks, any other of the team's non-Parsons or Lawrence defensive linemen).
Even Odighizuwa has not played up to his previous standard this season, though, and a team interested in him could decide to just pursue him in free agency rather than surrendering draft capital now. Lewis has played well in the slot and Dallas has Diggs, Bland and rookie Caelen Carson on the depth chart, so he could be the most logical target for opposing teams.
If thinking logically, Dallas should be looking to sell and collect even more draft capital than it is likely to have in the 2025 draft after losing several high-priced free agents last offseason. Alas, given Jones' proclivities and his inability to deal with the Cowboys not being relevant for even a portion of one season, it does seem fairly unlikely that the team will look to sell.