PALM BEACH, Fla. – It's crunch time for the Cowboys' coaching staff and front office with the NFL Draft approaching in just over three weeks and plenty of areas for improvement on the roster following a 7-10 season that resulted in Dallas getting the 12th overall pick.
As everyone begins to familiarize themselves with this year's crop of draft prospects, the Cowboys brass feels that there's quality depth at positions of need in this class, specifically at defensive tackle, defensive end and running back. With that, a window opens to take advantage of the low salary-cap hit, but you have to find the right players.
"I like the numbers in the areas that are particularly important to us…" Cowboys owner and general manager Jerry Jones said." "You see so much, many times young players, rookie players really contributing in the league. That's not new for a player to be outstanding but still it is a must in the NFL today for a draft class to come in."
"If you're going to be successful, it's a must for that draft class really carrying a lot of the heavy lifting and certainly live up to expectation."
From head coach Brian Schottenheimer's perspective in the early parts of watching point of attack (POA) tape on prospects, there is not a drastic difference between the grades that the Cowboys are assigning players at those positions.
I think there' a lot of depth on the defensive line, both interior and on the edge. I think there's a lot of depth obviously with the running back position," Schottenheimer said. "You start going through the film, which I'm through most of the POA tapes. You try to do that before you get in the draft process, and I mean there's guys at every level with every different grade on them that you're like, the difference is not that huge."
Cowboys COO and co-owner Stephen Jones echoed that sentiment with especially high regards for the running back position, a spot where the Cowboys added two external free agents in Javonte Williams and Miles Sanders.
"I think certainly the defensive line, both outside and inside, we think there's really good depth and players to be had," Jones said. "I think the running back group's really stout compared to past years, so I think there's a great opportunity to pick up young back."
All in all, the goal is always to fill the gaps in your roster during free agency so that you can have your pick of the best available players in the draft, like the Cowboys did when they selected Micah Parsons and CeeDee Lamb. Jones admitted that they hadn't done as good of a job in the first step of that approach in the past, but feels this offseason they have and will make the additions to do just that.
"The key thing in free agency, which probably didn't, you know on hindsight, didn't do as good a job as we've done in the past but feel like we got a lot of that done this year, is just getting the numbers, the players, you know that we need to solidify our rosters. So when we do get in the draft, regardless of position, if a great player is sitting there, that's when we've had our best drafts."
