The Dallas Cowboys front office is often praised for its ability to draft at one position: the offensive line.
History seems to bear that out, especially in recent years. Here’s a look at the Cowboys’ drafted offensive linemen in the first four rounds, dating back to the 2010 draft.
- 2011 Tyron Smith
- 2013 Travis Frederick
- 2014 Zack Martin
- 2018 Connor Williams
- 2019 Connor McGovern
- 2020 Tyler Biadasz
- 2022 Tyler Smith
- 2024 Tyler Guyton
- 2024 Cooper Beebe
- 2025 Tyler Booker
All 10 were starters for the Cowboys. Three – Williams, McGovern, and Biadasz – have become starters with other teams.
Tyron Smith had a Hall of Fame career in Dallas before playing one final season with the Jets.
Frederick’s career was cut short by a non-football illness while Martin retired after last year.
Tyler Smith, Guyton, Beebe, and Booker are likely to start this season. That’s an impressive run.
But where the front office has shined at drafting offensive linemen, they have not been so fortunate at another position.
The Dirty Dozen
Here’s a list of players Dallas has drafted at linebacker over the same period of time:
- 2010 Sean Lee
- 2011 Bruce Carter
- 2012 Kyle Wilbur
- 2014 Anthony Hitchens
- 2015 Randy Gregory
- 2015 Damien Wilson
- 2016 Jaylon Smith
- 2018 Leighton Vander Esch
- 2021 Micah Parsons
- 2021 Jabril Cox
- 2023 DeMarvion Overshown
- 2024 Marist Liufau
Parsons and Gregory were drafted as linebackers but were both used mostly as edge players.
Carter had four good years in Dallas before the Cowboys declined to re-sign him after the 2014 season. Wilbur was good as mostly a backup before joining the Raiders in 2018.
Both Hitchens and Wilson were very good for the Cowboys for four years, but they too were allowed to walk in free agency to Kansas City, where they both won a Super Bowl.
Cox had minimal numbers in his two years in Dallas before joining the Commanders in 2023.
When the Cowboys didn’t discard a linebacker after four years, they ran into a reoccurring issue. They couldn’t keep them on the field.
A MASH Unit
Lee only played in two games as a rookie without starting either. He missed the entire 2014 season with a torn ACL.
He only played in every game of a single season just once, in 2019, and only started in 13 of those 16 games.
When he was on the field, he was one of the league’s best.
But he missed 58 games in his 11 years in Dallas and barely started over 50% of the Cowboys games between 2010-2020.
Vander Esch had six great years. But he, too, could not stay healthy, playing a full season only twice out of the six.
His final season ended in the fifth game of the 2023 campaign, when a dirty play resulted in a career-ending neck injury.
Overshown has been a solid linebacker, but he hasn’t been able to stay on the field either.
He missed his entire 2023 season due to a knee injury suffered in the preseason. He played in 13 games last year before another knee injury ended his season in 2024.
He might be back by Thanksgiving Day this year.
The Exceptions
Smith, who was drafted in the second round with a pre-existing knee injury, missed the entire 2016 season.
However, he rebounded with four good years before playing in the first four games of his fifth season and ending up in Green Bay in the 2021 season. But he avoided the injury bug at least.
As did Liufau during his rookie year last year.
The Cowboys will need more injury-free seasons like Liufau’s from their linebackers going forward.
Maybe they should also try keeping the good ones around for longer than just four seasons too.
Had not really compared the success to failure results with the o-linemen and the linebackers. What I had noticed was the fails at defensive tackle as compared to the o-linemen.
Not trying to change the subject of your post but it just seems as the Cowboy defensive tackle scout team are on a never ending tenure of bad luck or just don’t know what they’re doing.
But your angle of lack of good linebacker health here is totally spot on though and definitely needed for any level of success at the 2nd level of the defense.
The only reason the LBs that the team keeps are the ones that keep getting injured is because they take a chance on the injury prone LBs later in the draft that are supposed to be high draft picks!! Jaylon Smith was supposed to be a top 5 pick in the 2016 draft, but we got him in the 2nd round because of his injury!! And he never really fully recovered from that injury either!! He played decent at times, but not to the level he would’ve played at if it wasn’t for the injury!! And then Sean Lee was about the same…. He was a first round talent that fell because of his injury history in college and most teams were worried about it and kept passing on him, so we decided to trade up 4 or 5 spots to make sure we got him in the 2nd round!! The only one we drafted in the first round that we got crapped on for was Vander Esch and it’s because everybody else was worried about his neck injuries and they felt he shouldn’t be drafted so high, but we were drafting so late in the first round that year that it mite as well been a early 2nd round pick!! Plus Vander Esch proved all those haters wrong and showed he deserved to be drafted that high!! He should still be playing right now if it wasn’t for that dirty play that ended his career!! But my point is that we have all injured LBs because we take a chance on the injury prone LBs that fall in the draft because of the injuries!! We take these first round talent LBs and draft them in the 2nd or 3rd round and just hope it works out for us and it’s worth trying because we’re getting that first round talent later in the draft!! And sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn’t!! But we still get that talent on our team and get some kind of play out of them, even if they do miss time every year!! So I think as long as we’re drafting this first round talent in the 2nd or 3rd rounds, it’s worth it because the talent is there!! But anyways, that’s why our LBs are hurt most of the time…. Because we draft the first round talent that’s injury prone, later in the draft!! And it seems like that’s the position that we focus on when it comes to drafting injury prone first round talent later in the draft too!! I don’t remember doing that with any of the offensive linemen or defensive linemen or RBs or any other position!! This year we did draft Shavon Revel in the 3rd round and he was a first round talent, but other than that, the only other ones we drafted were at LB!! And that’s why our LBs are always hurt!!
And I just happened to think…. Damone Clark was another early round talent with a bad injury that we drafted all the way down in the 5th round!! But he hasn’t been given much of a chance to play since he came back from his injury!! But that was just another example of us taking a chance on injured LBs later in the draft!! But it looks like we’re trying to move away from that with the recent draft picks like Marist Liufau and DeMarvion Overshown!! Even though Overshown has been injured a lot lately, he wasn’t projected to go earlier in the draft and he didn’t fall because he was injury prone!! As a matter of fact, a lot of people were saying we drafted him way too high because he wasn’t talented enough to be drafted that high!! But he proved them wrong!! But these 2 are the only ones we drafted that wasn’t injury prone!! And Overshown is the only one that just turned out that way!! But I think it’s only because of his style of play and how hard he plays!! And I think he’ll overcome his injury problem!! But that’s why the earlier LBs were injured all the time!! But sorry for such a long comment…. I guess I got a little carried away!!