Dallas Cowboys 7-Round Mock Draft: Trade Downs and Double Ups

6th Round, Pick 196

Simi Fehoko, WR, Stanford

Another familiar name from a previous mock draft, except this time he’s available about two rounds later. The thought process here might not originally make sense. The team signed Noah Brown to a one-year, veteran minimum contract and brought Cedrick Wilson Jr back as a restricted free agent. In this mock, I traded up to grab Terrace Marshall only for him to essentially wait a year. What’s the rationale for grabbing another receiver in this draft?

First, he was definitely the best player available. With eleven picks in this draft, the Cowboys are likely to draft an offensive player on Day 3 simply because he is the best player on the board.

Second, the wide receiver situation after this season is still a bit murky. Gallup is expected to leave, hence the Marshall trade up. The team could elect to move on from Brown and Wilson at a moment’s notice. Wilson Jr might have value as a key special teamer, but Brown?

Fihoko gives the Cowboys a big body threat, like Brown, while having better athletic ability and greater versatility to be used in a multitude of ways.

Head coach Mike McCarthy loves big wide receivers. The redshirt junior measured in near 6-feet-4, 222 pounds, and ran a 4.37-second 40-yard dash. Good chance McCarthy sees flashes of Marquez Valdez-Scantling’s field-stretching ability in Fehoko with an even bigger body.

In six games this season he caught 37 passes for 545 yards and three touchdowns. Averaging nearly 16 yards per reception, the All-Pac 12 receiver used his big frame and catch radius to catch contested passes downfield.

In a perfect world, the Cowboys would love to drop back and through passes to the intermediate and deep areas of the field taking advantage of their good offensive line, quarterback, and wide receivers. Fehoko has the athletic ability to beat press and off coverage, solid lateral quickness, and hip fakes to manipulate DBs hips in phase, and is aggressive at the catch competing for contested catches.

The production in six games was good especially accounting for the fact that Stanford continues to be a run-heavy offense from heavier personnel. In this case, as Dallas’s fifth or sixth receiver he could be a player the team grooms in the practice squad or uses in specific deep threat situations to take the top off the defense.