By Mark Halpern
At the beginning of this draft the only name I wanted for the Cowboys was Ohio St. safety Caleb Downs. In recent years the Cowboy defense has struggled, while the offense did it’s thing. The Dallas secondary was so bad last year that it literally cost Dallas the season. The offense would have to outscore the mistakes made by the defense and that was too much to overcome.However, with the departure of Micah Parsons the Cowboys had pick #12 from the Packers and there was only one target.
Who was the Cowboys’ target you may ask? Well if read my article weeks ago there was no secret that Downs was the target the real question became how could they possibly pull it off. The Cowboys knew they had a real uphill battle for this to happen. From what we know now is the Cowboys did try trading up to the #6 spot with Cleveland offering a mixture of picks to no avail but Cleveland ended up trading with the Chiefs to #6 dropping the Browns to #9. Well as you know that didn’t happen and when the Giants were back on the board at #10 all I could feel was the kick in the balls that Downs was gonna be a Giant. I was making my peace of it then the Giants went Offensive Line (mind you a massive help to NYG OL) my mind scrambling figuring out who had #11 and it was Miami. Again, Downs was dropping and dropping and by mere seconds things changed.
The Cowboys were one pick away from getting the one player this club wanted. The Dolphins stood in the way and there was no guarantee the Dolphins wouldn’t take him so Dallas did what it does best is create a Draft Day Trade. Dallas flipped pick #12 and two 5th round picks to move up one spot to get who they wanted and Miami made the deal and little did we all know that it was a mere few seconds before the picks would have been blown. With 3 seconds left on the clock the Cowboys got the pick in and Caleb splashed down safely just like Armstrong and Aldrin.
Reports of an injury is a big reason why Downs fell in the draft. Downs had a degenerative ACL ligament. Why does the NFL cringe when you hear ACL, MCL or PCL is that has to do with the knees and for football your knees play a very important part. Downs had been downplaying the news all through out the week. Is there genuine concern of course but, that is what the combine is for. It’s to see potential draftees at there upmost best. Downs impressed across the board but, the injury bug word got the best of the first 10 picks. Dallas got who they wanted and went along to have one of their better drafts in recent years.
Joining the Cowboys along with Downs is DE Malachi Lawrence, OLB Jaishwan Barham, OT Drew Shelton, CB Devin Moore (One of the Steals of the Draft), DE LT Overton and WR Anthony Smith. If Lawrence or Barham can excel early it should boost a defense that had a lot of problems last season.
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