For the 29th consecutive season, the Dallas Cowboys will be watching the Super Bowl from home like the rest of us following a dreadful 7-10 campaign that resulted in them missing the NFL Playoffs for the first time in four years.
This year's title game has to be particularly painful for America's Team as the NFC will be represented by one of the franchise's biggest rivals, the Philadelphia Eagles, who will attempt to keep the Kansas City Chiefs from becoming the first team in history to win three straight Super Bowls.
For the Eagles, Sunday marks their third trip to the Super Bowl over the last eight seasons. Their most recent appearance, of course, came just two years ago when they engaged in an instant classic with the Chiefs but ultimately suffered a 38-35 defeat.
The appearance before that, however, which came at the conclusion of the 2017 campaign, was much more successful as Philadelphia won its first and only Super Bowl title with a 41-33 upset of the New England Patriots.
As things went this past year for the Cowboys, they failed to make the playoffs during that 2017 season, going 9-7 to finish four games back of the 13-3 Eagles in the NFC East.
It's never easy watching a division rival win a championship. And while Dallas didn't have a ton of cap space with which to work during the offseason to bolster its roster ahead of the 2018 campaign, Jerry Jones was still in a position to make some moves.
But as has been the case so many times in recent years — and could be again this year — he failed to do so.
Trust us. When you see how the Cowboys handled the offseason following the Eagles' Super Bowl win, you'll see that no Dallas fan wants history to repeat itself if Philly wins a second Lombardi on Sunday, at least as far as free-agent signings go anyway because there is actually a silver lining here.
The Cowboys' big free-agent signing the last time the Eagles won the Super Bowl was Allen Hurns
That headline above pretty much says it all, don't you think?
Once the free agency period began during the 2018 offseason, the biggest deal the Cowboys made was signing wide receiver Allen Hurns to a two-year, $12 million contract.
It's not that Hurns was viewed as a terrible signing, at least not right away. Just a few years earlier, in 2015, he'd recorded 64 receptions for 1,031 yards with 10 touchdowns as a member of the Jacksonville Jaguars. In the two seasons that followed, however, he played just 21 out of a possible 32 games and averaged just 37 receptions, 480.5 yards, and 2.5 touchdowns per year.
Nevertheless, Hurns was considered a solid enough option to play alongside Dez Bryant and Cole Beasley. The problem there, though, was that Bryant was released in mid-April, which led to Dallas drafting Michael Gallup soon after.
As for Hurns, he ultimately proved to be a disappointment, as he caught only 20 passes during the 2018 season for 295 yards with two touchdowns. He was cut during the 2019 offseason after refusing to take a pay cut.
As for the other acquisitions Dallas made in addition to Hurns, here's a look at the remainder of the list and how they performed during the 2018 season:
|
Player |
Position |
Contract |
2018 Stats |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Deonte Thompson |
WR |
1 year, $1.8 million |
14 rec, 124 yards |
|
Cameron Fleming |
OT |
1 year, $2.5 million |
14 games, 3 starts |
|
Marcus Martin |
OG |
1 year, $880K |
Missed entire season with a toe injury |
|
Joe Thomas |
LB |
2 years, $3.6 million |
10 games, 14 total tackles |
That's it. That's the Cowboys' 2018 free-agent class.
Here's the thing, though. Despite not making any big moves during the offseason, Jones did swing a major deal during the season, as 2018 was the year he acquired Amari Cooper from the then-Oakland Raiders ahead of the trade deadline.
With Dak Prescott and Cooper forming an instant connection, Ezekiel Elliott leading the league in rushing for the second time in three seasons, and the Dallas defense allowing the sixth-fewest points in the league, the Cowboys regained control of the NFC East, winning the division with a 10-6 record. And not only that, they swept the Eagles in the process.
So, while recent history says the Cowboys will have a dreadful offseason if the Eagles win the Super Bowl this Sunday — which may obviously happen whether Philly wins or not — that same recent history also says Dallas will bounce back to win the division. So, we obviously like the latter around here.
