WATCH: Here is every play involving Dak Prescott’s shoulder after injuring it in the first quarter

The talk around Dallas this week leading up to the NFC East Championship game is how effective can Dak Prescott be with his injury to his throwing shoulder?

While there’s no way to be sure just how effective #4 will be on Sunday, we can take a look at his performance last wee AFTER injuring his shoulder to see how/if it hindered him. It should be stated that it’s unlikely that much swelling or inflammation of the shoulder had already kicked in during the game last Sunday, but it’s still something to look at as we wait to see how he does against the Eagles this Sunday.

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While it should be pointed out that this isn’t an extremely difficult throw, it is important to point out that the ball placement here, while avoiding an unblocked defender is on point.

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Here’s one of the few intermediate to deep throws that Prescott attempted after injuring the shoulder on Sunday. Prescott puts this ball right where it needs to be, but for some odd reason, Witten seems to fall over at the catch point. There's plenty of velocity on the football, and the ball placement is just fine.

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This throw gives me confidence that Prescott will be plenty capable on Sunday in Philadelphia. While avoiding a free rusher, rolling out to his right, then throwing 20+ yards down field across his body, Prescott gives Cooper a chance on a dart down the field. If his shoulder was severely injured, I don’t see a way that he’s able to get this amount of velocity on the football without being able to set his base, and get his lower half into the throw.

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Here’s another example of Prescott being able to put plenty of velocity on his throws, even from an awkward arm slot. Gallup makes a dangerous decision on this play by stopping his route, but thankfully the defensive back can’t handle the throw (due to the velocity), that hits him right in the numbers.

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Another confidence booster heading into Sunday. If Prescott is able to get this ball off, while being drug to the ground by a blitzing linebacker, I have a hard time imagining him not being able to give it a go in Philadelphia. Of course, adrenaline is helping with a lot of these in the moment, but still, it would likely take something freaky to hold Prescott out in week 16.

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Ball placement on the Witten touchdown could be a little better, but it’s still not a big enough miss where I question if this was due to the shoulder, or just a slight miss by Dak himself. There’s little room for error on this throw, due to the trailing defensive back, so that fact that Prescott got enough on the football, while also being somewhat accurate on another 20+ yard throw is very encouraging.

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While little-to-no-accuracy was needed on the Tavon Austin touchdown due to how wide open he was, it’s still encouraging to see that the shoulder didn’t stop him from launching a 59-yard touchdown (35 air yards) to Tavon Austin.

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*Quarterback sneak on 4th and 1*

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Another throw that shows plenty of velocity, ball placement, and shoulder mobility. This is a rather quick release for Prescott, from a sidearm arm-slot that he’s still able to get plenty of velocity on to give Randall Cobb a chance on the screen.

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If the shoulder was killing him, you’d think Prescott would be hesitant to run when things weren’t there through the air, but that was not the case on Sunday. Prescott was very aggressive to run when things weren’t there, which is surprising because most of the year that’s been something we’ve wanted to see more of.

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We saw Prescott throw from more awkward arm slots on Sunday than we’ve seen the whole season. Is that a good sign or a bad sign?

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Dak’s target depth in the second half was way down, but that had a lot to do with the game script, being up three possessions, and the running game was working as well as it could. This play here shows that he wasn’t checking down due to pain, or the inability to push the ball down the field. Pollard looks to be Dak’s fourth read on this play, so the willingness to still get the ball to the open man down field is there.

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*Quarterback sneak on 3rd and 1*

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*Broken play at the mesh-point resulting in a fumble between Dak Prescott and Tony Pollard. With the injured shoulder, Prescott jumps on the ball as if it’s a one possession game*

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*Kneel to end game*

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While it’s unfair to compare last Sunday to this Sunday, last Sunday post-injury shows a ton of encouraging signs to give Cowboys Nation confidence in their starting quarterback, with the NFC East Championship on the line against the teams biggest division rival.