Dallas Cowboys: Can they outrun the rest of the NFC East?

The 2017 NFL season kicks off in just over a week for the Dallas Cowboys, who will attempt to win the NFC East for the second year in a row. Each team had some solid production from their backfield in 2016, so how will they line up this season?

They days of the all-powerful feature back seem to be numbered, unless you’re Dallas Cowboys running back Ezekiel Elliott. Although, some would still argue that his days are numbered. But that’s a discussion for another day.

Still, like the modern day MLB starting pitcher, the modern running back rarely carries the workloads that their predecessors did. There are exceptions to the rule like Elliott or Minnesota’s Adrian Peterson. But the NFL model has strayed more from the one guy with 300 carries to a committee of all-purpose backs.

In essence, that’s made things a little more difficult to differentiate between the different styles of running backs and still give a fair comparison. That’s why, for the sake of argument, we’ll consider rushing and receiving yards by whole backfields and not just the one guy that got all the carries.

This essentially takes away the coaching style aspect of the game and puts it more into the overall effectiveness of the unit. It also eliminates injuries and time away while giving credit to depth. So, here’s how each NFC East backfield compares heading into 2017, in reverse order.