It was cutdown day on Tuesday, as you might have gathered from our recent posts here. As the dust is settling, there are two players the Cowboys will regret keeping before the end of the year.
The good news, such as it is, comes from the fact that there was one on each side of the ball.
The better news is that both mistakes can quickly be rectified as soon as players return from IR.
First, let’s review what is (currently) the 53-man roster. We’ll start with this list per this post from the Cowboys PR Department on X:
Below is the @dallascowboys initial 53-man roster. pic.twitter.com/w7IOScLSIe
— Dallas Cowboys Public Relations (@DallasCowboysPR) August 26, 2025
Interesting Decisions
- Quarterbacks
- Dak Prescott
- Joe Milton
Right off the bat, we see Dallas has only retained two quarterbacks.
They signed Will Grier to the practice squad. He will be dressed as the “emergency third quarterback” for now.
- Running Backs
- Javonte Williams
- Miles Sanders
- Jaydon Blue
- Phil Mafah
- Hunter Luepke
As for the running back room, the Cowboys retained five backs.
One, Mafah, will start on injured reserve. It will be interesting to see if Sanders remains on the roster once Mafah is cleared to return.
- Wide Receivers
- CeeDee Lamb
- George Pickens
- Jalen Tolbert
- KaVontae Turpin
- Ryan Flournoy
Here’s where the miscue takes place on offense. They cut the wrong Jalen.
Yes, Tolbert had better numbers last year than Brooks.
He was the WR2 in 2024, so he should have had better numbers.
But Tolbert looked terrible in preseason and out in Oxnard. Brooks was having a solid camp.
The Cowboys are going to regret retaining Tolbert, especially if they lose Lamb or Pickens.
- Tight Ends
- Jake Ferguson
- Luke Schoonmaker
- Brevyn Spann-Ford
Schoonmaker is down to his last chance. He has not shown much in his first two years.
Spann-Ford could easily surpass him at TE2 before the halfway point of the year unless the lightbulb goes off over Schoonmaker’s head soon.
- Offensive Line
- Tyler Guyton
- Tyler Smith
- Cooper Beebe
- Tyler Booker
- Terence Steele
- Nate Thomas
- Brock Hoffman
- T.J. Bass
- Ajani Cornelius
It’s hard to argue against the choices made for this unit. Especially with Asim Richards being traded to New Orleans.
But, like Schoonmaker, Steele needs to get it together.
Or he might be the next lineman out the door.
Questions Abound On Defense
- Defensive Line
- Micah Parsons
- Dante Fowler
- Sam Williams
- Marshawn Kneeland
- Donovan Ezeiruaku
- James Houston
- Osa Odighizuwa
- Solomon Thomas
- Mazi Smith
- Jay Toia
- Perrion Winfrey
It’s hard to think that Jerry Jones would be dumb enough to trade Parsons. However, if the Packers are offering the world, maybe he should listen?
It isn’t hard to imagine Jones being spiteful enough to franchise tag Parsons for two years to keep him in Dallas though.
If a deal isn’t reached soon, that becomes more of a possibility.
But the real defensive blunder made by the Cowboys was in retaining Smith. Both Toia and Winfrey outplayed Smith in preseason.
Smith’s lone tackle against the Falcons was only because Atlanta’s o-line forgot to block him.
- Linebackers
- Kenneth Murray
- Jack Sanborn
- Marist Liufau
- Damone Clark
- Shemar James
Would Dallas drop one of the five to make room for DeMarvion Overshown when he returns in November?
If not, who loses their roster spot when he does come back? That’s going to be the move to watch as we get deeper into the fall.
- Defensive Backs
- Trevon Diggs
- DaRon Bland
- Kaiir Elam
- Andrew Booth
- Caelen Carson
- Zion Childress
- Malik Hooker
- Donovan Wilson
- Markquese Bell
- Juanyeh Thomas
Childress and Booth have already been released – after the post above was dropped – to make room for cornerbacks Trikweze Bridges and Reddy Stewart.
Childress is expected to re-sign with Dallas for the practice squad, assuming he clears waivers.
Booth? I think Dallas is better off without him anyway.
Carson is also heading for IR to start the year.
Rock Solid Unit
- Special Teams
- Brandon Aubrey, K
- Bryan Anger, P
- Trent Sieg, LS
These three guys have been so stable for Dallas for so long, it’s easy to forget they’re on the team.
Until it’s time for Aubrey to boom a 60-yard field goal, of course.
I can tell your not a Cowboys fan, or you just don’t pay attention to what’s going on with them!! First off, why would they cut Mazi Smith!? He’s a former 1st round pick and he’s just now going into his 3rd year!! And he hasn’t had the chance to play under the same defensive coordinator 2 years in a row not once since being drafted!! And to make it even worse for him, he hasn’t even got to play at the same weight 2 years in a row yet!! He went from playing at the weight he was in college to being drafted and Dan Quinn having him lose a bunch of weight, and then Mike Zimmer comes in and makes him gain all that weight back, and he actually started playing good around week 10, which means they should’ve kept him at that weight, but then Mike Zimmer leaves and Matt Eberflus comes in and what do you know, he makes Mazi lose a bunch of weight yet again!! Mazi is obviously not the problem, the problem is all the change he’s had to go through since being drafted!! He can be a really good player if they would just stop messing with his weight!! Let him play at the weight he’s comfortable playing at and leave it at that!! But making him change his weight up and down every year isn’t helping him!! It’s only hurting him!!
And another thing is you said we would be better off without Andrew Booth,, and that is way off from the truth!! Booth was actually looking really good in camp and preseason!! He looked like he finally got the hang of playing in the NFL!! And we cut him for a couple of nobodies, and you say we’re better off!? That’s crazy!! We would’ve been a lot better off with Booth and Childress than we are now with Trikweze Bridges and Reddy Stewart!! Neither one of them are as good as Booth or Childress are, so we would’ve been better off keeping Booth!! The only player I would’ve rather had over Booth is Mukuamu, and even that would be a close one because of how good Booth has looked so far in camp and the preseason!! But they let both go for nobodies!!
And one more thing…. There’s more I can say, because you have a lot of bad takes, but I’m gonna stop with this one!! And I’m gonna go with Jalen Tolbert…. You do realize that he hasn’t been given many opportunities this offseason right!? All of the attention has been going to Pickens and Lamb!! But when Tolbert was given an opportunity, he capitalized on it!! He made quite a few good plays!! He just didn’t show much in the preseason games because he had to play with Milton, and he don’t have much chemistry with Milton!! And Milton didn’t really look too good until the 3rd preseason game anyways, and Tolbert wasn’t playing by then!! And Brooks didn’t really look too good compared to Tolbert until the 3rd preseason game, and even then he only made a couple plays!! If I’m being honest, I would have liked to have Brooks on the 53 man roster, but not over Tolbert!! I would’ve taken him over Flournoy though!! But Flournoy got the spot because he looked better on special teams!! If it wasn’t for that I think Brooks would’ve been on the roster over Flournoy!! If it was me I would’ve put Brooks on the 53 man roster over Flournoy just because of the catch Brooks made in the last preseason game!! That touchdown he caught was a really good catch, and that alone would’ve gotten him picked over Flournoy!! Flournoy kept dropping passes thrown his way, so I think Brooks should’ve been the one to make the roster over Flournoy, but not Tolbert!!