Former Alabama and Oregon wide receiver Traeshon Holden has been one of the most talked-about Cowboys this month.
An undrafted free agent signing this April, Holden immediately caught the fanbase’s attention before ever stepping on the field. His collegiate stat sheet and highlight tape provided the hype, but his performance is now sustaining it.
Holden, 23, has shined in training camp and in-game; his two catches for 42 yards led all Cowboys receivers against the Rams on Saturday.
Brian Schottenheimer even proclaimed that we will see Holden “moving up the depth chart.”
There is only one problem: his odds of making the 53-man roster are still low.
The Hard Reality: Traffic Jam At WR Likely Leaves Holden Behind
Even if you move Traeshon Holden up in Dallas’s wide receiver room, he is still not on the 53-man roster after cuts. Let’s do some basic Cowboys roster math here.
CeeDee Lamb, George Pickens, Jalen Tolbert, KaVontae Turpin, and Jonathan Mingo are all near locks to make the roster. That’s five receivers before you even start considering anybody else.
If history tells us anything, Dallas will likely keep six, as they’ve done the last couple of years. That leaves one spot remaining for Holden to grab.
His main competition for it? Second-year wide receiver Ryan Flournoy, who had a fine performance himself against the Rams, and held one of those six spots as a rookie in the 2024 season.
https://twitter.com/calvinwatkins/status/1954395192582393893Flournoy, by all training camp estimations, has improved from last year. Would Dallas really cut him in favor of an undrafted free agent?
Holden’s NFL Interest: If Cut, Pathway Back To Dallas Is Unlikely
Outrage over one of the fanbase’s favorites being cut in August, only for him to return to the practice squad, is a yearly tradition at this point.
The hard truth is, most of the time, fans overrate their players, and their league-wide interest isn’t nearly what the expectation is. In the case of Holden, that may be the opposite after the roster cuts go down.
It’s hard to envision a world where some wide receiver-needy team doesn’t find a spot on the active roster for Holden.
Very few teams have a Lamb and Pickens-esque duo heading up their receiver room.
This means their decision to cut Holden, if it comes to that, also carries the weight of letting another team have him and his high potential. That’s a tough pill to swallow, but it may soon be the reality for the Dallas Cowboys.
