5 Dallas Cowboys playing their last (regular season) game for Dallas

Dallas Cowboys on the way out

Jourdan Lewis, CB

Last we have Jourdan Lewis. Frankly, re-signing him last offseason was a bit of a surprise. The Dallas Cowboys already re-signed Anthony Brown to a multi-year deal and showed they heavily favored Brown in both the slot and boundary.

But as we saw, Dallas would come to need Lewis this season. Their second round pick Kelvin Joseph had availability issues and Brown was needed to play the outside so Lewis took over the role of nickel.

In retrospect, retaining Lewis was definitely the smart move. But looking towards next season there may not be a place for Lewis, and like Noah Brown at WR, Lewis could be a progress stopper to the young guys behind him.

Trevon Diggs is obviously locked in on one side and the Dallas Cowboys would like to pencil in Kelvin Joseph in on the other side. Brown is still the best slot CB on the team and Nahshon Wright is developing down the ranks. Add a rookie or two to the mix and you have a promising young CB room.

Cutting Lewis will cost $2.3M but also save $2.3M. This is money that could be used to bring back Brent Urban or partially fund re-signing a starting SAF like Jayron Kearse. At the end of the day $4.6M is too much to spend on a CB4 and that’s why I think Lewis will be cut

Notable omissions

You may notice names like Leighton Vander Esch, Randy Gregory, and Michael Gallup are all missing. I believe re-signing Gregory will be objective No. 1 this offseason and expect him to be back. And frankly, he could be the only notable player returning.

But I hold out hope for Gallup (now that he’s injured) and LVE. LVE is going to be cheap and while I’ve been notoriously critical of him over the past 3 seasons, I know a bargain when I see it. The coaching staff likes him and he’ll likely come cheap so I think there’s a decent chance he signs a one-year deal to stay.

Additionally, the market is what will probably keep Michael Gallup in play as well. Gallup’s injury couldn’t have come at a worse time. With a typical ACL recovery anywhere between 9-12 months, I don’t expect teams will be lining up to sign Gallup for WR2 money.

As I explain below, it may be in both parties best interest to sign Gallup for a year or two so he can rehab in a familiar system, rebuild his value, and hit free agency as a hot commodity rather than come-back story.

Once again I don’t expect Dallas to be very active in outside  free agency. I suspect a role player or two on the D-line and a veteran LB to help Micah Parsons and Jabril Cox (maybe also LVE), but Dallas will be looking to the draft to fill most vacancies.