Super Bowl LVIII has arrived and NFL fans across the globe get to watch NFC champions San Francisco 49ers battle versus AFC champions Kansas City Chiefs.
It feels like just yesterday the 2023 season started with this same Chiefs team hosting NFC upstart Detroit Lions.
Now the Chiefs will attempt to be the first back-to-back Super Bowl champions since the New England Patriots in 2003-2004.
Along with the end of the season comes the NFL awards, which are supposedly voted on before the playoffs begin.
Like most awards where there can only be one winner, fans and even current and former players love to throw their two cents in on who the rightful winners should be.
This season the Dallas Cowboys had players in the running for three of the major NFL awards.
It should come as no surprise to hear that none of those three Cowboys were able to bring any award home.
There always seems to be some narrative created by the media and opposing fans to discredit the accomplishments of Cowboys players.
Cowboys players were snubbed in this go-round of awards, so let’s talk about why a player with the star on his helmet should have walked up to the podium.
Dak Prescott
We have to start with the man who touches the ball first for the Cowboys on every offensive play.
He’s the leader of the offense and one of the leaders of the entire team.
Prescott was snubbed from not only one but two awards this season.
FedEx Air Player of the Year
The FedEx Air Player of the Week award is a weekly award where voting takes place on the official NFL social media accounts.
It’s essentially a social media award only so those who hate Dak Prescott for no reason will laugh that I’m even bringing it up.
I just couldn’t let the blatant ignorance go by without pointing it out.
Prescott won this weekly award four times this season, more than any other individual quarterback.
Before the results were released, the NFL Twitter/X account ran four different polls of which Prescott won every single one of them.
Brock Purdy won the award and whoever runs the NFL Twitter/X account has since deleted the other four polls showing Prescott as the fan-voted winner.
They couldn’t make their hate any more obvious.
NFL MVP
Now we move on to a more official and respected award, the Associated Press NFL MVP award.
I’m not by any means saying Prescott should have been a lock to win this award, but there is an argument he shouldn’t have lost it to Lamar Jackson.
The 2023 version of Dak Prescott is the best version we have ever seen on the field and I believe he was truly deserving of the MVP award.
Prescott finished near the top of the league in nearly every major metric, and finished better than Jackson in the following categories:
- Completion percentage
- Passing yards
- Yards per attempt
- Touchdowns
- Big-time throws
- QB Rating
Jackson bested Prescott by throwing two fewer interceptions, but he also threw 12 fewer touchdowns.
The real difference is Jackson took his team two rounds further in the playoffs but ended up with the same result as Prescott.
DaRon Bland
DaRon Bland just completed his second season of NFL football, finishing his first two seasons with 14 total interceptions playing both inside and outside of the formation.
The prospect of a defensive backfield with Bland on one side and Trevon Diggs locking down the other boundary is a reason for excitement.
This year I believe Bland was snubbed out of the NFL Defensive Player of the Year award.
Cowboys’ superstar EDGE Micah Parsons also received votes for this award, but I don’t feel he deserved it more than Bland.
It was given instead to Myles Garrett of Cleveland.
Garrett, a Texas native, is a hell of a player so I’m not saying he doesn’t deserve it.
I’m simply saying I believe CB DaRon Bland of the Dallas Cowboys deserved it more for what he was able to accomplish.
Bland led the entire NFL with nine interceptions, but the real stat to put him over the top is the NFL-record five that he was able to return for touchdowns.
The second-year cornerback set the record during a Thanksgiving blowout of the Commanders.
Setting the record with seven games left in the season is an accomplishment in itself.
The NFL world may never see what Bland accomplished again.
Surely we will see Myles Garrett’s 14.0 sacks in a season many times over after this.