Tight End Jason Witten's retirement has left a crater in the Dallas Cowboys offense, and the team did not have a clear plan of succession in place. As such, it's possible that the search for their next starter may not be decided by the end of the preseason.
Barring a surprising free agent move for a veteran, Dallas will go into training camp with a young and inexperienced group at tight end. Will those few weeks of camp and four preseason games be enough to decide such an important role in the offense?
In only his fourth season and with a measly nine career catches to his name, Geoff Swaim is the senior of the group. That alone illustrates the problem; Swaim is the only known entity and we still barely know him.
The Cowboys spent a fourth-round pick on Stanford's Dalton Schultz, and there are things that jump out at you about him immediately. He has the size and game that reminds young of a young Witten, and of course those words get any Dallas fan excited.
But even Jason, legend that he proved to be, didn't hit the ground running. He started sporadically as a rookie and only had nine catches in his first eight games.
Then of course there's Rico Gathers, one of the most intriguing practice squad players we've ever had in Dallas. After a hot preseason last year, Gathers suffered a concussion that took him out to start they ear. Even though he was symptom-free as the season progressed, the Cowboys kept him on injured reserve all year.
Gathers has exciting athletic potential, but enters the NFL so raw as a former basketball player in college. Making the leap to significant playing time in pro football is a lot to ask, and the missed time last year isn't going to help.
So you have a guy trying to transition from rebounds to touchdowns, a fourth-round rookie, and a “veteran” who was battling for playing time with James Hanna last year. See the issue?
That's not to say that one of these guys can't emerge as a great player. But the problem is that there's really nothing that dictates who should be relied on to start camp.
Dallas will likely go with Geoff Swaim given his experience edge, but he's also in the final year of his rookie deal. If Schultz or Gathers makes noise early, it could make the Cowboys wants to change direction quickly.
If the Cowboys wind up rotating the players with the first team, you could wind up now having a clear answer by the end of August.
We've seen position battles continue into the regular season before. It's not ideal, but there's no substitute for seeing how guys respond in real NFL action.
Right now, things at the TE position are set up that way. Swaim has a shot at running with his opportunity as the deferred-to veteran early, but the team could move quickly to Schultz or Gathers depending on performance.
This uncertainty is great for us as writers and makes preseason games a lot of fun, but it also means a potentially shaky position group going into September. That's not ideal for a team trying to get back to the playoffs.
