Not much went right for the Dallas Cowboys in their crushing loss on opening day to the New York Giants. Christian Parker and his defense have taken the bulk of the blame, and perhaps rightfully so, but Brian Schottenheimer and the offense looked like a rudderless ship in Week 1 as well.
Ryan Flournoy may be the key to getting the unit back on track.
After earning an extension just before the 2026 NFL season, hopes were high for the Cowboys' No. 3 wideout. But the Flournoy fan club left Sunday Night Football feeling like Dallas didn't get what it paid for, and that Flournoy has to play a whole lot better in several facets to turn this thing around.
If he can run block more effectively and start to get going in the pass-catching department, then it will open up the run game much more, and it will allow the true stars of the show, CeeDee Lamb and George Pickens, to feast if Flournoy can just keep opposing defenses honest. Let's dive in.
Cowboys' Ryan Flournoy struggled tremendously against Giants in Week 1
Glancing briefly at the stat sheet tells part of the story for Flournoy: he caught just two passes for 22 yards against New York on five targets, and technically, Dak Prescott threw his lone interception of the night when putting the ball in the area of Flournoy.
Toward the end of last season, Flournoy proved to be much more capable than that. And because he never stepped up and made the Giants pay, especially against their lesser cornerbacks, all the attention could remain on Pickens and Lamb, both of whom really failed to get going.
It's not like New York has an elite secondary, so Flournoy needs to be consistently winning against the No. 3s and the rotational players so that opponents can ease their grip on the star duo of Pickens and Lamb. If he can do that going forward, then Dallas can start to get this thing back on track.
More crucial than his lack of receiving production and route-winning on Sunday, though, was some very poor blocking effort and execution from Flournoy. PFF gave him a 48.4 blocking grade against the Giants, and it is not difficult to figure out why.
On the very first play of the game, Flournoy went in motion but was tasked with cracking back and slowing down Abdul Carter. As one can see on film, that didn't happen. That is a tough assignment for Flournoy, and he had some help, but it was fruitless, as Carter brought down Javonte Williams easily.
When Schottenheimer gave the ball to Lamb on that end-around, Flournoy completely whiffed on his block attempt, and Lamb was stuffed for no gain. On another play, Flournoy looked late to the party run blocking and never got his hand on a Giant before Williams went down without much of a gain.
Throughout the second half, as one reporter noted, it seemed like the Cowboys decided to start clearing Flournoy out on deep routes instead of asking him to run block. That is certainly an issue, because receivers have to block to get the rock, colloquially speaking.
Ryan Flournoy can help turn the Cowboys' offense around
Dallas fans know what Flournoy can be. And as I'm prone to saying, Week 1 can be a liar; it's not always indicative of what a team or player is capable of, and the information provided by one game cannot be extrapolated to an entire season.
Flournoy can still have the breakout campaign that fans thought he would have coming out of the offseason program and preseason. It all starts with him just wiping the slate clean after Sunday Night and getting back to what he's good at.
If he can just have success in the short and intermediate areas of the field, as he did last year, and make a handful of contested catches to keep the sticks moving, then the Cowboys' offense will open up. He has a sure set of hands across the middle, and Flournoy must get back to winning there.
Improving his run blocking, of course, will also help this offense tremendously. Without the ability to run effectively, Dallas' offense will become predictable and easy to stop. If Schottenheimer can't run outside and trust his receivers to block, a whole element of the operation goes away.
Part of his improving his run blocking, to be fair, will be the Cowboys putting him in more advantageous situations. I'm not sure he needs to be the first guy touching Abdul Carter at a weird angle on the first play of the season, but I digress.
In a lot of ways, this piece sounds like a criticism of Flournoy. But it's actually the opposite. Fans know what he is capable of, and he just didn't show it in Week 1. His not being at his best hurt the Dallas offense because he is a key figure in it running smoothly.
Obviously, you could say this about anyone, but the better Flournoy plays, the better the Cowboys' offense will be. If he can take the pressure off Lamb and Pickens and at least be average in the blocking department, there is a whole universe out there for the Dallas offense to see.
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