The Dallas Cowboys enter the 2026 season with a lot of question marks. The defense needed to be completely rebuilt, and now they have a first-year defensive coordinator calling plays with Christian Parker.
There is still some concern at left tackle, as Tyler Guyton hasn’t taken the step they had hoped for yet. And of course, the jury is still out on Brian Schottenheimer as the head coach of this franchise.
But one spot the Cowboys don’t have to worry about is at quarterback. Dak Prescott is coming off one of the best seasons of his career and is fully healthy entering offseason workouts. Prescott has firmly established himself as one of the top-10 quarterbacks in the league, and you can make a strong case that he is closer to No. 5 than No. 10.
And yet, there is still one big question that remains regarding the Cowboys' franchise quarterback.
Cowboys QB Dak Prescott is in a unique position heading into 2026
In a recent article by Dan Graziano of ESPN, he wrote about every team’s biggest quarterback question going into the 2026 season. For the Cowboys, there is no question about the caliber of quarterback they have under center. Prescott has been the longest-tenured quarterback with his respective team since the 2023 season. He’s going into his 11th season and is one of the oldest projected starting quarterbacks heading into Week 1.
Graziano shares the belief that Prescott is one of the top quarterbacks in the league, but his biggest concern is whether the Dallas starting QB will add more playoff success to his resume. Here is a snippet of his thoughts on Prescott going into a critical year for him and his team:
“It's easy for fans to wonder whether he'll ever attain the postseason success they expect, especially if the Cowboys again struggle to even contend for the postseason. But if we assume the defense is improved and that Prescott stays healthy, the Cowboys should be in good position to return to the playoffs. It might not be totally fair to posit a question that can't be answered until January at the earliest, but Prescott is one of the most established, entrenched starters in the league. There aren't many more questions for him to answer. Except the big one.”
Prescott is in a very unique situation for a starting quarterback in the NFL. What he does in the regular season almost doesn’t matter in any way. He’s had huge statistical seasons. He’s led the NFL in passing touchdowns. They’ve won double-digit games four different times in his career. And yet, none of it really matters for Prescott in 2026.
All that matters is that Prescott gets the Cowboys back to the postseason and wins several playoff games. There aren’t many quarterbacks in the league where the regular season is essentially irrelevant to their national perception, but Prescott, along with Lamar Jackson and Josh Allen (to name a few), all need postseason success and not gaudy regular-season numbers to improve their legacy among NFL fans.
Prescott knows that the only thing that matters is postseason success from this point on. For him to be considered one of the best quarterbacks in franchise history, he has to start winning more in the playoffs. That’s what made Roger Staubach and Troy Aikman the legends that they are.
Unfortunately, winning in the playoffs is more than just about how well the quarterback plays. And in the NFC, the Cowboys will likely be facing teams in the postseason with stacked rosters and elite head coaches. That’s going to make it even more challenging for a player like Prescott.
But such is life in the NFL for the franchise quarterback of the most famous team. It’s not fair to only be judged on postseason success, but that’s the stage of Prescott’s career that we are currently in right now.
And until the Cowboys break their NFC Championship Game drought, Prescott probably will never fully get the respect that he deserves, despite being one of the best and most consistent quarterbacks in the league over the last decade.
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