Establishing the 10 most important members of the 2019 Dallas Cowboys

There are a lot of ways to look at the 2019 Dallas Cowboys roster. Like, a lot.

You can organize players by contractual value, perceived greatness on the field, or overall importance to the team. We’re here to sort by importance.

It’s important to note that when you’re considering how important players are to a football team that you remember we’re talking about the game of football. Some positions are inherently more important because of the impact that they have on the game, that’s the simple truth of it all.

This is something that fellow BTBer Tony Casillas and I discussed on the latest episode of The 75O. We did our best to figure out who the 10 most important players on the team are ahead of training camp, and while our lists generally featured the same 10 people we prioritized them a bit differently.

It’s interesting to see how many players from the list are on offense versus defense. It’s also fascinating to consider how important Amari Cooper is when he wasn’t even on the team a year ago. Life moves that quickly in the NFL.

Besides Tony and myself, we polled some of the fellow front page writers here at BTB to see who they thought were the 10 most important players on the team. Here are the results.

You’ll note that Dak Prescott comes in at first for everyone, again so much of that is the position he plays. Interestingly, we almost had a clean sweep with Tyron Smith in fourth place, Howman and Sisemore were the only two to differ and had the all-world left tackle only trailing Prescott.

You can certainly make an argument for Tyron Smith being that important, the game in Atlanta two years ago is your best example. While I chose to go Amari Cooper personally (given that he helps your most important player significantly) there was some thinking that DeMarcus Lawrence should in fact command the second spot.

Tank’s importance to the team can certainly not be overstated, he’s the richest man in Dallas Cowboys history for a reason. Lawrence sets the tone for the defense and is the biggest difference-maker on that side of the ball. He has the ability to change a game in a way that can only be outdone by a quarterback, so he’s certainly worthy of second as well.

Xavier Woods just missed my list, but it feels like his importance is partly weighted on potential and how important he’ll need to be. The Cowboys have been struggling to find a star playmaker at safety for longer than we’d all care to admit, what’s truly important is that Woods becomes that guy.

Perhaps the most debated player among people will be Ezekiel Elliott. Three of the group had him in third while some weren’t as strong believers. This is sort of the same argument as Dak Prescott in that the running back position is simply nowhere near as valuable as the ones that precede him on the list. That’s a big argument that people make against paying Zeke as well, for what it’s worth.

Where do you stand here? Who are the 10 most important players on the Cowboys in your estimation? Remember that we’re talking about importance in the game of football, not ranking their individual talent across their respective positions.