Cowboys news: Rico Dowdle to IR, Dak Prescott progress, status of Donovan Wilson and Trevon Diggs

We are only at Wednesday, but the midway point of the week has already brought some turbulence for the Dallas Cowboys.

The day technically began with some positive news in the team promoting Greg Zuerlein to the active roster from the PUP list, but trouble soon followed with the team adding two more players to the Reserve/COVID-19 list.

With Malik Hooker, Israel Mukuamu, and as of Wednesday Damontae Kazee on the list, the Cowboys are now down a number of safeties. What’s more is that Donovan Wilson officially has a groin injury that was sustained during Tuesday’s practice. On top of that, Trevon Diggs has a non-COVID illness and will also miss practice.

That is (likely) 75% of the team’s starting secondary out at the moment which certainly presents a challenge for the leadership of the group which is absent Dan Quinn at the moment for COVID reasons as well.

With all of these moves the Cowboys were sitting at 79 players on the active roster. They will need to make room for the players on the Reserve/COVID-19 list when they are eligible to return, but for now that is technically where they are at. Or rather were at, considering running back Rico Dowdle is now headed to injured reserve.

Dowdle had cemented his spot as RB3 on this team, although considering that the workload will be primarily shared between Ezekiel Elliott and Tony Pollard, there likely weren’t going to be a lot of touches for him in 2021. Dowdle’s season is officially over and the Cowboys won’t see him until 2022. At the very least he is a part of the team’s future.

There are now five players on injured reserve. The four who were already there are Reggie Robinson and Sewo Olonilua (who were outright placed there) as well as Anthony Hines and Hunter Niswander (they were given the waived/injured designation originally and reverted to IR).

That puts the Cowboys at 78 players on the roster at the moment, but things will certainly continue to change over the course of the next week when the team “finalizes” their 53-man roster. There are two candidates to be placed on injured reserve at the season’s beginning (which would make them eligible to return during the season unlike the others) in Trysten Hill and rookie Chauncey Golston.

Oh and did we mention that Dak Prescott is upping his participation level? Again, it’s been a day.

This is a positive sign for the Cowboys as they sit 15 days away from the season opener against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. National headlines continue to openly wonder what Dak’s status is, but all signs point to a clear runway ready for takeoff.

Update: 3:00pm ET

It is a hip injury for Rico Dowdle.

Something of note as well, Israel Mukuamu is back. Great to see.

Also... Dak did a bit more than 7-on-7.

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