FanPost

Will Dustin Vaughan Make it to the Practice Squad? Survey Says Yes

After an upbeat performance in an otherwise woeful preseason game, many Cowboys fans are wondering if rookie UDFA QB Dustin Vaughan can be safely 'stashed' on the practice squad. They note what happened last year, when the QB desperate Cleveland Browns poached Alex Tanney from the Boys PS in November. Of course, the Browns were truly desperate just to have somebody to start as current Cowboys backup Brandon Weeden and current Cincinnati Bengals backup Jason Campbell were hurt at that time following Ohio native Brian Hoyer's being lost for the season. Now Johnny Manziel is competing with Hoyer for the starting job and this early in the preseason, NFL teams rosters are stacked at the QB position. Some NFL teams like the 49ers are even carrying 5 signal callers with wide open competition for -- at the most -- 3 roster spots followed by one practice squad spot. Clearly each NFL team has plenty of warm bodies, the real danger is later in the season when quarterbacks get hurt.

For now, here's a short list of the QBs that Vaughan would need to outplay to land a spot on an active roster somewhere. I don't pretend that this is an exhaustive list, I'm primarily focused on rookies and PS eligible young players. All names are taken from OurLads.com which has a handy feature for looking up depth charts across the NFL's 32 teams based on position. I've been looking up DEs lately to see if any other 4-3D running franchise's Labor Day weekend cast offs like ahem, Seattle, St. Louis or Chicago could help our roster:

Rookie or 2nd year PS Eligible QBs
Atlanta - Jeff Matthews - Cornell-R
Arizona - Logan Thomas - Virginia Tech-R
Baltimore - Keith Wenning - Ball St-R
Cincinnati - Matt Scott - Arizona-1 yr
Denver - Bryn Renner - N. Carolina-R
Detroit - James Franklin - Missouri-R
Green Bay - Chase Rettig - Boston College-R
Jacksonville - Stephen Morris - Miami-R
Kansas City - Tyler Bray - Tennessee-1 yr
St. Louis - Garrett Gilbert - SMU (Texas transfer)-R

This isn't an exhaustive list but I stuck only with the names that I knew would be PS eligible for sure. In reality there are more QBs out there like Alex Tanney that some franchise may want competing with Vaughan for a 53 spot, but they're not PS eligible and that list would be considerably longer. Plus, having the flexibility of an emergency third QB on the roster who can then be cut and placed on the practice squad when the starter comes back is probably important to many front offices around the league.

Yes, I like Dustin Vaughan. Yes, I think his game is already developed beyond that of Alex Tanney's at a younger age, and he definitely has a better arm than Tanney. But is keeping Vaughn on the 53 worth going extremely light at OL, LB, or DL? Especially when warm bodies on the defensive line are absolutely necessary with Demarcus Lawrence and Anthony Spencer both likely out for 6 to 12 weeks of the regular season? I think so. Even if Henry Melton's groin tweak is nothing serious or Terrell McClain's ankle is healed up, the Cowboys are so shorthanded on the d-line that the fullback or 9th OL spot may have to be sacrificed just to keep 26 defenders on the roster. Especially if the Boys plan to carry 4 running backs (with Ryan Williams) or the more likely scenario of 3 backs (Murray, Dunbar and Randle) with one fullback. For the record I'm one of those who thinks the Boys need to go old school and keep Tyler Clutts or better yet J.C. Copeland around.

So should we take seriously Bryan Broaddus suggestion not to play Vaughan in the 4th quarter with the scrubs against the other teams scrubs? I don't think so, I say give Vaughn as many reps as possible and let the chips fall where they may. Although Vaughn's size and arm may be rare for the UDFA ranks, this team can find a potential backup QB of the future in the mid-rounds of next year's draft. The time to worry about protecting Vaughan from getting poached is later in the year -- hopefully when the Cowboys have both Demarcus Lawrence and Anthony Spencer back healthy.

For more thoughts on roster building and related issues, please see my last FanPost about whether the Cowboys should trade wide receivers LeRon Byrd or Chris Boyd for help at backup defensive end.

Another user-created commentary provided by a BTB reader.