Unsurprisingly to anyone who was paying attention during the offseason, the Dallas Cowboys have themselves a running back problem. Starter Rico Dowdle has been fine, but that’s all. Backup Ezekiel Elliott, meanwhile, doesn’t seem to like being a backup very much … despite very much playing like one. After Jerry Jones more or less ignored the position over the offseason, spending his spring wringing hands about the salary cap and how much it would cost to find new deals for Dak Prescott, CeeDee Lamb and Micah Parsons, it once again seems like this offense will only go as far as Prescott is able to take them by himself.
And as if that weren’t frustrating enough, the guy that Dallas decided to let walk in favor of Dowdle and Elliott picked a hilarious time to have his biggest game of the season — and give everyone a glimpse of what might have been had Jones not decided to get in his own way yet again.
A lot of ink has been spilled over the names that the Cowboys passed on at running back this offseason, from Derrick Henry to Joe Mixon to Saquon Barkley to Aaron Jones. But it shouldn’t get lost that Dallas also passed on the guy who started for them in 2023: Tony Pollard, who wound up signing a three-year deal for just over $10 million guaranteed with the Tennessee Titans in free agency…