Is the Dallas Cowboys special teams unit tops in NFC East?
By Tyrone Starr
Philadelphia Eagles (silver medal)
Jake Elliott – K, Cameron Johnston – P, Rick Lovato – LS, Darren Sproles, Corey Clement, Wendell Smallwood – returners
Dallas Cowboys (gold medal)
Dan Bailey – K, Chris Jones – P, L.P. Ladouceur – LS, Cole Beasley, Jourdan Lewis, Tavon Austin – returners
The Dallas Cowboys win the battle but lose the war.
By virtue of total points, the Eagles stay one point ahead of Dallas in the composite score for all positional rankings. The Cowboys do, however, lay claim to the best special teams unit within the NFC East.
When you look at the numbers, it’s not particularly close either.
Elliott missed five field goals last season and three extra points. Bailey has missed two extra points in 278 attempts.
Last season Jones was in the top ten in both net punting average and pinning teams inside their own 20-yard line. This season will be Johnston’s first ever in the National Football League.
In fact, the only reason the Eagles won the silver medal was due to their return game.
Call it a lifetime achievement award if you like, Darren Sproles is legendary at returning kicks. His seven total punt returns for touchdown are tied for seventh best in league history. He’s also seventh all-time in total kick and punt return yards.
Dallas, meanwhile, does have one of the most electric returners in all of football in Austin. It remains to be seen if the coaching staff is smart enough to use this weapon though. If they choose to do so, the Cowboys would have a clean divisional sweep of best options at all special teams spots.
Here is the final breakdown of how each team finished in the medal count. Along with that is a refresher of how each team placed at each position.
| MEDAL BREAKDOWN BY TYPE | ||||
| GOLD | SILVER | BRONZE | NO MEDAL | |
| PHILADELPHIA – 18 | 3 | 4 | 0 | 2 |
| DALLAS – 17 | 4 | 1 | 3 | 1 |
| WASHINGTON – 10 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 3 |
| NEW YORK – 10 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 3 |
| MEDAL BREAKDOWN BY POSITION | |||||||||
| QB | RB | WR | TE | OL | DL | LB | DB | ST | |
| PHILADELPHIA | silver | none | gold | gold | silver | gold | none | silver | silver |
| DALLAS | bronze | gold | bronze | none | gold | silver | gold | bronze | gold |
| WASHINGTON | gold | bronze | none | silver | bronze | none | silver | none | bronze |
| NEW YORK | none | silver | silver | bronze | none | bronze | bronze | gold | none |
Next: Dallas Cowboys: 15 best first-round picks of all-time
I hope you enjoyed this series as much as I did making it. Feel free to comment below on how you think it went.