The Dallas Cowboys played a football game at AT&T Stadium on Saturday night and provided us with a lot of opportunities to evaluate and analyze them in different ways.
We are still talking about preseason football, but it is football nonetheless. The finalization of the 53-man roster (not to mention the season opener) is quickly approaching so these games are important sets of data to mine through.
In the name of doing that we have set our latest Stock Report to discuss which Cowboys improved or weakened their position on the team through the group’s latest outing.
Here we go.
Stock Up: Andrew Booth
Andrew Booth has had a rough Cowboys career to date with his name surfacing more for negative things than it has for positive. Sometimes that is simply the way that things go. But you have to keep scratching and clawing, and sometimes if you do things can turn your way. This happened for Booth as he caught an interception early in the game on Saturday and was even able to take it back for a score.
The state of the cornerback room is an interesting one with Trevon Diggs still on PUP and rookie Shavon Revel on NFI. It is going to take someone giving the coaching staff a reason to keep them around and who knows if Booth did that with this play. It certainly couldn’t hurt, though.
Stock Up: Damone Clark
We all knew that Matt Eberflus was going to get the most out of the Dallas Cowboys linebackers when he took over as defensive coordinator. Rookie Shemar James and second-year man Marist Liufau popped in the preseason opener at Los Angeles.
Damone Clark had his moment against Baltimore. And then some.
This is an interesting season for Clark as he is a bit of a holdover from previous staffs. With DeMarvion Overshown on ice for a little while he has a chance to really carve out a role and we know that Flus can be instrumental in that as noted.
Stock Up: Kemon Hall
Roster battles are very much a thing in the middle of the preseason and Kemon Hall did what he could to try and lock down one himself.
This was definitely a right-place-right-time sort of interception, but those count just as much as beautiful breaks on the ball. You have to make your presence known and Kemon Hall has done a great job of that outside of this particular moment.
Stock Up: Tyler Booker
Saturday marked the first time that Tyler Booker suited up for the Cowboys, and while he did not exactly stonewall anybody, he looked the part. That matters very much.
It was great to see the Cowboys make sure that Cooper Beebe was out to rock and roll with Booker. The state of the quarterback play (more on that in a moment) did not exactly help them out, but they certainly did all they could.
Stock Up: Shemar James
It is very clear that the Cowboys have a physical option at linebacker with rookie Shemar James. He has found a way to pop through the first two preseason games and very much brings that nature to his game – physicality. Opportunities are there to contribute early on at linebacker and James is someone who can really capitalize on that.
Stock Down: Joe Milton
We do not need to sugarcoat it. Saturday was bad for Joe Milton.
The thing about this is that we always knew he was going to need time. It isn’t fun watching him grow before our eyes, but he is in his second season in the NFL. He is a project quarterback. His timeline with Dallas is different than Trey Lance in terms of when each was acquired.
None of that justifies how Milton played on Saturday. He was 2 for 8 in the first half, for crying out loud. Milton’s play is so poor right now that it is making the evaluation of everything around him much more difficult. That is the true issue.
Stock Down: Brian Schottenheimer
Speaking of!
Look. Dak Prescott was not playing in this game. Neither was CeeDee Lamb. Micah Parsons remains in need of an extension. You get the picture.
But some starting offensive linemen were in this game. Moreover, Brian Schottenheimer went on record in saying that the team was going to try and run the football. They didn’t exactly do that. Should we be panicking right now? Absolutely not. But the Cowboys looked a little unprepared for the second preseason (emphasis on that word) week in a row. That is not exactly great.
It is hard to say what the team should do with the Joe Milton situation, but that is on the head coach to figure out. The honeymoon ended long ago.
Stock Down: Miles Sanders
Miles Sanders “started” this game for the Cowboys at running back and carried the ball 7 times for 15 yards. Notably, his second carry lost five yards and put the team in position for Joe Milton to take a safety (a point I didn’t even bring up with Milton in his Stock Down because that felt mean).
Phil Mafah has flashed. We have yet to see what Jaydon Blue can really do, but we are all obviously intrigued. Miles Sanders sort of needs to give this team a reason to keep him and did not exactly do that on Saturday.
Do the Cowboys need to carry four running backs? Sanders has to make sure they answer yes if he wants a spot on the team.
Stock Down: Wide receiver depth
This is sort of picking on Joe Milton again, but we did not exactly get a chance to evaluate the receivers on this team in this game which is very frustrating. Jalen Brooks had a nice catch and Jonathan Mingo had a 49-yard one.
Unfortunately he was hurt after that with a knee issue that kept him out of the rest of the game. To that point, there was simply no way to figure out who the contributing receivers are on this team further down the depth chart. Through two of the three preseason games to still have that question is not ideal.
Stock Down: Ryan Flournoy
While Ryan Flournoy should feel an understandable level of frustration with not having an opportunity to really prove himself (I promise I am not trying to bring Joe Milton up over and over) he did have a costly penalty that may have wiped out an eventual touchdown for the team.
That cannot happen. In a time where the offense is really struggling their bigger missteps are more magnified and one of them belonged to Flournoy on Saturday night.
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