Report: Dak Prescott on track to start Week 1 and could have played Saturday night against Houston

In some sense Saturday marks the most important day of the preseason period for the Dallas Cowboys as they will host the Houston Texans in their dress rehearsal to properly ready themselves for the regular season (which begins in 19 days).

As the day began things were a bit rocky for the Cowboys in terms of the league’s national media. During Friday night’s preseason game between the Arizona Cardinals and Kansas City Chiefs, ESPN’s Adam Schefter speculated that Dak Prescott “may not be back all season long.”

Ultimately this is an opinion, but it is from one of the league’s foremost insiders which gave it enough merit to at least talk about out loud. Of course, the ambiguity of the statement sort of protects Schefter from any real blowback as he isn’t really declaring anything. He’s pontificating.

It seems that we have stumbled upon an insider war, though, as NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero took his own turn on Saturday afternoon. He reported that Dak Prescott has had “absolutely no setbacks” in his rehab and that he remains on track to play in Week 1. Pelissero added that Prescott could have played tonight against the Texans, but that the Cowboys feel there is no reason to risk anything.

Pelissero added that medical professionals feel “good” about the progress that Dak is making and noted what Mike McCarthy did earlier in the week in that the Cowboys are planning to give Dak more work next week.

On the subject of Mike McCarthy, the fact that this report comes from Tom Pelissero is notable in that the insider is the one who led “The McCarthy Project” when the head coach was looking to return to the NFL in early 2020. Pelissero also had an exclusive interview with both McCarthy and Prescott while the Cowboys were in Oxnard. This is admittedly also speculation, but if there is an insider that McCarthy trusts, it is seemingly Tom Pelissero.

None of this is being said to finger-point or say that one insider is better than another, however, it seems that Tom Pelissero is the more trustworthy person here given how close he has been to the Cowboys under Mike McCarthy.

Update: 3:40pm ET

ESPN’s Stephania Bell added that Dak Prescott’s lat strain is reportedly unrelated to his ankle injury from last year.

This had been a popular couple of dots to connect. Seems as if it is not the case, though.