Trey Lance improved his roster chances, trade value with Vegas win

Stop the presses!

The Dallas Cowboys’ offense scored a touchdown in the preseason. They liked it so much, they even did it twice in Saturday night’s 27-12 win over the Raiders in Las Vegas.

The touchdown outbreak even reached across the line to the defense, which scored its own touchdown on a 69-yard pick six.

Not to be outdone, kicker Brandon Aubrey nailed a 66-yard field goal, tying Baltimore’s Justin Tucker for the longest in NFL history.

Of course, Tucker hit his record-setter in the regular season. Aubrey will have eight indoor games in 2024 to try to match, or exceed, 66 yards in the regular season.

In short, there was very little to criticize about Saturday’s victory.

That’s a far cry from last week’s poor showing in Los Angeles against the Rams.

Trey Lance Improves

Trey Lance’s future in Dallas still remains unclear, despite an overall good showing on Saturday.

He was 15-of-223 for 151 yards with a touchdown pass to rookie Ryan Flournoy. Lance added 34 yards on seven carries and a two-yard touchdown to seal the win.

He definitely looked better than he did last week against the Rams.

Despite that, he’s still throwing a little high on most of his passes.

It should be remembered that Lance is only in his fourth year. He never saw the field last year while serving as the Cowboys’ third quarterback.

His first two years out in San Francisco didn’t give him much time for development either.

He started four games, and only played in eight overall in those two years at that. Add in that he was knocked out for the year in the second week of the 2022 season.

He hasn’t played in a regular season game in nearly two years. Which means he’s had a lot of rust to knock off this preseason.

The good news is that, judging by Saturday’s game, he’s looking better.

The question remains, will it be enough for him to be the Cowboys’ backup quarterback when they take the field in Cleveland on September 9th?

Cooper Rush hasn’t done much – then again, he’s only had a couple of drives so far.

Dallas knows what they have in Rush. But for some reason he looks disinterested so far.

Does he know he’s got the job and Dallas is just showcasing Lance for trade bait?

Or does he see the writing on the wall and has already checked out?

We’ll find out soon enough.

Other Standouts

Other than giving up one long bomb, the Cowboys’ defense put in another solid effort.

The unit held the Raiders to just 12 points on a touchdown and two field goals.

Kemon Hall, a fourth-year player out of North Texas, made his case for making the team. With Las Vegas driving to try to take a fourth-quarter lead, Hall stepped up.

Hall picked off Aidan O’Connell’s pass at the Cowboys’ 31 and raced 69-yards untouched to give Dallas a 20-12 lead on the first play of the quarter.

Lance’s touchdown just before the two-minute warning sealed the game.

The defense gave up a 48-yard pass from Gardner Minshew to Tre Tucker, and a 17-yard run by Zamir White early in the game. Then they settled down and did a solid job.

The special teams unit had a rough night, despite Aubrey’s booming field goal.

Aubrey had a kickoff go out of bounds to give Las Vegas the ball at the 40. The kick coverage needs work as they gave up some big returns on both punts and kickoffs.

He Did What?

Kansas City’s Patrick Mahomes is just playing with the rest of the NFL right now.

During the Chiefs’ 24-23 loss to the Lions on Saturday, Mahomes broke out a behind-the-back pass to Travis Kelce.

The son of a major league baseball pitcher – and a pitcher on the diamond when he was in school – has decided to try his hand at hoops on the gridiron too.

Scrambling out of the shotgun, Mahomes was looking for Kelce. The tight end wasn’t where he was supposed to be, however.

Rather than throw back across his body to connect with Kelce, Mahomes opted for the behind the back pass.

Of course it worked. This is Patrick Mahomes.

The play went for eight yards and a first down. It also led to a Chiefs’ field goal.

Now the rest of the league has one more thing to account for when Mahomes takes the field.

It will also likely be one of the few preseason plays that makes the NFL highlights for most of the regular season to come.