RADIO
Heading into the season, Fantasy Football Expert Frankie Soler will take an early look into each NFL team’s fantasy potential in 2015, keying into some depth chart changes and battles for starting jobs. In our third part of the series we look at the Dallas Cowboys. All previous Team Previews can be found here.
The Dallas Cowboys returned to the playoffs last season for the first time since 2009, clinching their division with a 12-4 record. A large part of the success that brought Dallas back into the postseason was the play of running back DeMarco Murray. Murray has since departed for the Philadelphia Eagles, which opened up a host of questions about Dallas’s ground game going forward. With the addition of Darren McFadden, this has the potential to be the most intriguing running back position battle of the entire off-season. However, the Cowboys still remain one of the more fantasy friendly teams in the league.
Offseason Acquisitions – RB Darren McFadden
No Longer on the Roster – RB DeMarco Murray
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Quarterback
They don’t refer to Tony Romo as the Romo-Coaster for nothing, folks. Quarterback Tony Romo has been notoriously one of the most polarizing players in the NFL in both real-life and fantasy football. This isn’t unwarranted as Romo’s play often has its ups and downs throughout the course of the season. That being said, Romo is still one of the more reliable late-round options for those who prefer to wait on a quarterback. Despite having an average year in terms of passing yards last season, Romo finished fourth in passing touchdowns with 34 and lowered his interception total to just nine. Those numbers are certainly good enough to net you a top 10-12 fantasy QB in any format.
Something the numbers won’t tell you this year is whether or not the Dallas offense will change due to the departure of DeMarco Murray. The Cowboys leaned on Murray heavily last year, giving him the ball early and often. We’ll get to the specifics of his usage in a bit but as it pertains to Romo, but it’s possible that the Cowboys decide to go a little more pass-heavy in the absence of Murray. Despite that possibility, I don’t think there’s a high enough chance of that happening to warrant bumping Romo up a few spots in fantasy rankings. The key to utilizing Romo for fantasy purposes favors owners who prefer to wait on a quarterback. I have no issue with being the tenth, eleventh, or even very last guy to select a QB in a 12 team league and ending up with Romo. A smart strategy in that scenario would be to double down and take a second potential starter rather quickly so you give yourself two shots at netting a legit passer. There isn’t much new to see here with Romo; what you see is what you get at this point in his career.
Wide Receivers
Remember those 34 touchdowns Tony Romo threw last year? Does it come as a surprise to anyone that Dez Bryant caught 16 of those touchdowns? Those 16 receiving touchdowns were the highest among all wide receivers last year. Bryant’s 1,320 yards via 88 receptions on 138 yards certainly helped his fantasy production as well. I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know so we’ll keep this short and sweet; Dez Bryant is still a top-notch fantasy stud. He’s a top five player at his position and you’re pretty much nitpicking as to where you place guys like Bryant, Antonio Brown, Demaryius Thomas, and Jordy Nelson anyway. As far as the rest of the team’s wide receivers are concerned, nothing has changed between 2014 and 2015. Both Terrance Williams and Cole Beasley remain in Dallas and neither guy possesses any significant fantasy value. Williams is firmly cemented into the number two WR slot on the depth chart so if you’re in a deeper league that starts three receivers, you can do worse than Williams but he’s not a guy I’d go out of my way to roster. Dez Bryant is the guy you want as far as Dallas receivers go and that’s pretty much all you need to know.
Running Backs
Prior to the start of free agency and the NFL draft, there were legit rumblings of a potential trade between the Cowboys and the Minnesota Vikings that would send Adrian Peterson to Dallas. Once that faded out, the next question was who, if anyone, would Dallas add to replace DeMarco Murray. The longer time went on the more likely it become that Joseph Randle and Lance Dunbar would be competing for the job amongst themselves until the Cowboys finally made a move to sign Darren McFadden. At this point in his career, McFadden is more of a name people know than he is a running back you can depend on though. Year after year McFadden was lauded as a lock for top 10 fantasy greatness with the continuous caveat of “if he can stay healthy.” The problem with that pipe-dream was that even when he was healthy for brief periods of time, McFadden never really materialized as being that high of a talent and the dream was dead…or so we thought.
Now in Dallas with a monstrously beefy offensive line, the McFadden apologists are back, albeit with slightly less force. Early reports out of Dallas suggest the dreaded running back-by-committee approach between McFadden, Randle, and Dunbar. Although this is likely the safer strategy for real-life purposes, it doesn’t do much for us fantasy wise. In looking at last year’s numbers, the Cowboys fed DeMarco Murray the ball a whopping 392 times, the most in the NFL by 80 attempts and 102 more than the third most in Le’Veon Bell at 290. No one currently entrenched in the Dallas backfield is going to come anywhere remotely close to that number. That being said, I do think there is a realistic chance one of the three backs beats out the other two. My money is on Randle based on the fact that even when Murray was still in Dallas, the Cowboys managed to feed him the ball nearly twice as much as Dunbar. You simply can’t trust McFadden to stay healthy long enough and as mentioned previously, he’s floundered when healthy anyway. One of the defenses of McFadden has always been that he was stuck on a below average Oakland Raiders team. Luckily for him, the offensive line in Dallas is arguably the best in the league so there is a tiny chance he could end up being “the guy.” Even still, I expect this team to utilize a committee approach but with Randle leading in attempts and the potential to take over as the single primary back. As far as the depth chart is concerned, a reasonable expectation is for the team to roll with Randle, McFadden, and Dunbar in that order.
Rookie & Tight Ends
The Cowboys went fairly defense heavy in the 2015 draft so there isn’t anything to report as far as rookies are concerned. Dallas still intends to utilize longtime veteran Jason Witten at tight end, which should come as a surprise to no one. Witten has been serviceable for the last two years so don’t expect that to change. He’s one of those TEs stuck in that 9-12 range at the position so at that point it really comes down to personal preference. Ideally you can just wait to be the very last guy to draft a tight end and let whoever is left come to you. Gavin Escobar came on slightly last year (and was supposed to become the successor to Witten) but as of now there's been no indication that he'll be taking over anything.
It’ll be interesting to see how the ground game shapes up in Dallas so hopefully your fantasy draft is late enough to provide some clarity on that situation. Beyond that, Dez Bryant is the clear-cut stud on the Cowboys with Tony Romo and Jason Witten being respectable options at their positions. You can do far worse than drafting a Dallas Cowboy in 2015.
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