Dallas Is a Roster Fire With Three Separate Blazes, and the Front Office Has One Garden Hose

The Cowboys finished 7-10 last season and missed the playoffs. That sentence alone should be enough to force urgency. But the number that actually tells the story is the one buried in the final stretch: Dallas went 4-6 over their last ten games, getting outscored by nearly six points per contest. The offense didn't fall apart — Dak Prescott threw for 4,552 yards and 30 touchdowns, Javonte Williams ran for over 1,200 yards and 11 scores, and George Pickens was genuinely one of the most productive receivers in the league with 93 catches for 1,429 yards and 9 touchdowns. What fell apart was everything behind them. The defense couldn't hold leads. The depth couldn't absorb attrition. And now, as training camp opens, the Cowboys are staring at three simultaneous crises that don't have easy answers.

Start with the contracts, because nothing else gets resolved until this does. Prescott, Lamb, and Pickens — the three players who made Dallas's offense dangerous — are all unsigned to long-term deals. Pickens hit his July 15 deadline without an extension and is now playing on a franchise tag, which means either the two sides are far apart or the Cowboys aren't certain he's their future. Lamb missed thirteen games last season and still produced over a thousand yards; you don't let that walk without a fight. And Prescott, entering camp with a questionable designation, is the kind of situation that breaks franchises. The Cowboys signed Sam Howell as a backup, which is prudent insurance — but it's also a quiet admission that the front office knows this negotiation could drag. History is instructive here: teams that let multiple offensive cornerstones reach free agency simultaneously rarely keep all of them. The Cowboys need to pick their order of priority and execute it before the season makes the decision for them.

The linebacker situation is, if anything, more immediately alarming. Rashan Gary is the only linebacker who logged meaningful snaps in 2025. One. The entire position behind him is populated by players who haven't proven they can hold up at this level. Charles Snowden, listed third on the depth chart, is suspended for the first three games — which means he's unavailable precisely when the Cowboys most need to evaluate their options. DeMarvion Overshown earned honorable mention recognition among off-ball linebackers, and he's active, which matters. But a position group that typically requires three or more reliable contributors is running on fumes before a single preseason snap has been played. There's a reason the idea of signing Bobby Wagner has surfaced in the conversation around this team. My read is that the Cowboys don't just need depth there — they need a proven voice and a reliable body, and they need it now.

The defensive tackle picture is structurally broken in a different way. Quinnen Williams is the starter, he's on an expiring contract, and there is no one behind him who played a meaningful snap last season. Zero. Tommy Dunn and Kelvin Gilliam are on the depth chart in name, but neither contributed in 2025. That's not a depth problem — that's a single point of failure at a position the entire defensive line depends on. If Williams walks in free agency or gets hurt, Dallas has nothing. This is the kind of roster construction that looks fine in a spreadsheet and collapses on contact with a real season. Teams that have navigated this successfully — think of the better-run defensive fronts of the last decade — always maintained at least a rotation piece who could eat snaps. Dallas doesn't have that, and they haven't addressed it.

Here is my declaration: the Cowboys will not make the playoffs in 2026 unless they resolve at least two of these three crises before Week 1. The offensive talent is real and proven. But the 2025 season already showed what happens when that offense has to carry a defense that can't hold a lead — they won close games at a 57% clip and still finished 7-10, because the margin for error evaporated every time the score got comfortable. A team with no linebacker depth, no defensive tackle rotation, and three unsigned stars playing under uncertainty isn't a contender. It's an offense waiting to be exposed. The Cowboys have the pieces to be dangerous. They don't yet have the structure to be good.