Cowboys 53-man roster prediction: 5 players it is difficult to leave off

Dallas Cowboys roster cuts are never an easy decision.

By RJ Ochoa@rjochoa Aug 28, 2023, 11:00am CDT

It is never easy to put together a 53-man roster. This year feels especially tough. There are plenty of players we would love to see the Dallas Cowboys hold on to, but at the end of the day you simply cannot catch them all. Ash Ketchum had it lucky in that sense.

During this time of year there will be more 53-man roster predictions than hot takes about Trey Lance and Dak Prescott, and like the citizen of the internet I am I have assembled one of my own. It is right here for you to agree with or roast into oblivion.

One assumption is Chuma Edoga is going to be placed on injured reserve (although he will need to be carried on the roster initially, it is difficult to assemble this while factoring all hypothetical roster gymnastics) and that Jourdan Lewis is still on the PUP list. Please remember that things are always subject to change at a moment’s notice as evidenced by the news of Josh Ball having a soft tissue injury broke shortly after I shared mine on the aforementioned internet.

This is why it is always a good idea to keep up with our tracker here at Blogging The Boys. Any sort of news item or rumor that pops up in advance of the “initial” roster will be featured there and considering we update the timestamp after anything is added it is the best way to stay up to date on the franticness associated with this time of year. You can visit our tracker right here.

However the roster shakes out, there are going to be players left off who we wish were not. Here are five players that were difficult cuts for this prediction.

Will Grier

It needs to be said again that Will Grier was incredible in his final game with the Dallas Cowboys. The performance was one thing, but the circumstances that it came under make it all the more impressive. Many people would have folded had they been placed in the same boat that Grier was. That he rose to the occasion says a lot about him and likely/hopefully earned him a job elsewhere.

The Cowboys have a very interesting project on their hands at QB3 now in Trey Lance, but it is a bummer in some senses that it could not be Will Grier. Sometimes that is just the way that this all tends to go. Best of luck to Grier in whatever comes next, hopefully he lands with a team we have no issues rooting for.

Isaiah Land

NFL: AUG 12 Preseason - Jaguars at Cowboys

Obviously Isaiah Land has been rather impressive, but it is hard to carry him on this roster. The hope is that the Cowboys can stash him on the practice squad as you simply can never have enough players like him. If that winds up being the case then perhaps he has a future with this team in 2024, but right now it is a struggle to find how someone like Dante Fowler is going to find legitimate snaps rushing the passer. To be clear this is all part of a very good problem to have.

Malik Davis

Everything about putting together a roster is about numbers and it doesn’t makes sense for the Cowboys to carry four running backs where Malik Davis is one of them. Tony Pollard, Rico Dowdle, Deuce Vaughn and Hunter Luepke are the options. Perhaps Ronald Jones factors into things when he is back from suspension but even then that is part of what makes keeping Davis a hard proposition.

Davis has been more than serviceable when the Cowboys have called on him but the numbers just do not work in his favor right now. Rico Dowdle earned the second spot, Deuce Vaughn is his own thing and Hunter Luepke offers a specialized bit of goal line duty.

The latest video on the Blogging The Boys YouTube Channel features me breaking donw my 53-man roster prediction for the Dallas Cowboys. You can watch it right here or on our YouTube Channel as noted. Make sure to subscribe to the channel (which you can do right here) so you do not miss any of our videos or live shows!

Juanyeh Thomas

I’ll freely admit that this might be where I am the most wrong. Thomas has been impressive all of us for a while now and he may very well have done so to the point that the team wants to have him a part of their regular operation.

Part of what will be interesting is going to be how the Cowboys approach their linebacker position. That group is light in this prediction, but perhaps Dallas is comfortable counting Markquese Bell there and therefore wants Thomas as a more traditional safety. That is certainly possible.

If the Cowboys do move on then again, fingers crossed for practice squad.

Kelvin Joseph

NFL: AUG 01 Dallas Cowboys Training Camp

When Saturday night ended it seemed like Kelvin Joseph had earned his place on this team’s roster. Some discussion from The Dallas Morning News has swayed my opinion.

Like with a lot of places on the roster a lot here has to do with something really unknown in the status of Jourdan Lewis. If Dallas activates him off of the PUP list then it stands to reason that there is legitimate cause for moving on from Joseph, but without that it is hard to see how the move makes total and complete sense.

Joseph has done well since being tasked with playing more special teams and in nickel and seemingly offers something that the club can benefit from on a daily basis. But it is not 2021 anymore and being a second-round pick no longer carries the security that it did for Joseph in the past.