4 Cowboys on Thin Ice After Sunday Night Football Loss to 49ers

3. Brandin Cooks

The trio of CeeDee Lamb, Brandin Cooks and Michael Gallup is supposed to be one of the best groups of wide receivers in the NFL — a real "pick your poison" situation for defenders.

But Cooks has yet to really show any flashes of why Cowboys fans were so excited to have him in Dallas.

Cooks earned 4 targets in the passing game on Sunday Night, catching just 1 of them and gaining 7 yards. So now he is four games (five weeks) into his Cowboys career, and he hasn’t topped 30 yards in a single contest. 

In fact, Cooks' season-long receiving total of 73 yards is one that WR3 Michael Gallup managed to eclipse in a single game in Week 3.

Cooks hasn't even managed to out-target Gallup in a game since Week 1.

Cooks is in Dallas on a two-year contract, but there would be some solid cap savings for the Cowboys if they simply moved on from him next offseason. That possibility has to be looming large over his shoulder at this point.

Was the play-calling great? No. Did Dak make any impressive throws to get Cooks the ball? Not really. But at some point the excuses just don't cut it. This wasn't a simple one-off bad game from Cooks, but the most recent entry in a worrying trend.