Dallas Cowboys and Dallas Mavericks: A Tale of Two Teams
ARLINGTON, TEXAS – NOVEMBER 28: Devin Singletary #26 of the Buffalo Bills runs the ball against Trysten Hill #97 of the Dallas Cowboys in the second half at AT&T Stadium on November 28, 2019 in Arlington, Texas. (Photo by Ronald Martinez/Getty Images)
The hype was evidently there heading into the season, so where did it start to unravel?
If I told you the Dallas Cowboys season was starting to look disappointing in April after the free agency haul and playoff win, you probably would’ve dismissed any other word that came out of my mouth.
But now in December, with hindsight being 20/20, we can see the Cowboys started to shoot themselves in the foot from April.
The 2019 draft
The first clear mistake was the selection of Trysten Hill in the second round. Let’s be clear, the pick made sense. After the 2019 season, the Cowboys were going to have one defensive tackle on contract and that defensive tackle only plays inside on occasion.(Tyrone Crawford) In addition, the wounds of the Rams’ loss were still fresh as many remember CJ Anderson’s career day against the Dallas run defense.
Even with the eventual need at the position, it was more or less evident that the Cowboys reached for Hill knowing most second round talents are providing solid production to their respective teams. Hill didn’t do that in college and thus far into his pro career… he hasn’t done that. (He has shown signs of progression in the past few games so that’s good!)
To make matters worse, the Cowboys needed some quality safety depth and they elected to pass on two rookie safeties, Juan Thornhill and Taylor Rapp, who have gone on to… provide solid production to their respective teams. However, after preaching a best player available mentality, the team wanted the scheme to dictate this pick and that clearly wasn’t the right move. Hey, sometimes teams miss and its okay if the rest of the team can pick up the slack.
As the draft progressed, the Cowboys took an offensive guard in the third round, drafted a speedy running back in the fourth round, drafted two members of the Jackson 5 in the fifth round, a productive safety in the sixth round, and a running back and defensive end in the seventh round.
In a way, they had adopted a Seattle Seahawks mindset as they traded back in the draft to accumulate more picks. However, unlike Seattle, Dallas’s late round picks haven’t produced like Seattle’s normally would. Running back Mike Weber and cornerback Mike Jackson Jr were released, defensive end Jalen Jelks and offensive guard Connor McGovern were sent to IR. That left Trysten Hill, Tony Pollard, Donovan Wilson and Joe Jackson as the only active members from this draft class.
Of course, we didn’t expect this in June when Organized Team Activities started. So where else did the Cowboys go wrong?