Dallas Cowboys: A few bye week bite-sized bullets

Dallas Cowboys stay quiet at the trade deadline

The Cowboys’ offense doesn’t seem to be overly interested in adding at any position. The skill positions are set and it wouldn’t make sense to offload assets for a rental player. As far as the offensive line, La’el Collins is slated to return and provide depth. I know there are grumblings of top-grading Tyler Biadasz at center, but I simply don’t see it happening. He is young, the Cowboys like to develop offensive linemen, and I see the trend continuing here.

Defensively, their safety moves happened last offseason and are proving fruitful. The linebacking group is very much set for now and playing at a higher level than last year. The defensive line has been over-performing even with the absence of Demarcus Lawrence and Neville Gallimore, each of who will be bringing reinforcements to the rotation upfront down the back half of the season.

It isn’t necessarily fun or going to draw headlines, but my gut tells me this team really likes who they currently have in-house and the production that they are getting across the board. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it.

Ezekiel Elliott should be prepared to be a closer. Rest is his friend.

The Cowboys end their season with four of their final eight games on the road in fully outdoor stadiums. Three of these are at NYG, at PHI, and WAS, and toss in a trip to Kansas City as well. The Cowboys have been fortunate to avoid any bad weather and unforeseen circumstances slowing them down from utilizing whatever tactic they choose on offense.

That will likely change down the final stretch. When the weather changes and becomes unpredictable, the ground game travels no matter what. I would not be shocked to see the Cowboys slightly monitor Zeke’s pitch count and make sure he is fresh for the home stretch.

The Cowboys are fortunate enough to have Tony Pollard who has proven he can carry the load as evidenced by what he did when Zeke was out last season. Pollard put up 132 total yards and two touchdowns in Elliott’s absence. I would like to see him mixed in even more than he has been to give Zeke some rest, but also to make defenses respect his explosiveness and wrinkle in the offense even more.

The Dallas Cowboys are in a great spot as we wait through the bye week and have a favorable next five games. The schedule sets up for the Cowboys to position themselves for a run at the ever-important first-round bye as long as they don’t stumble against lesser teams. This team should come out healthy next week, fresh, and look to continue the success seen through the first third of the season.