Dallas Faces a Nightmare as Their $82 Million Star Threatens to Vanish from the Field Just Before Week 11.QQ
It’s been a long time coming.
The Dallas Cowboys’ roster isn’t good enough to contend with the NFC’s elite. However, some of the personnel decisions made by Brian Schottenheimer and Matt Eberflus have not helped the cause.
Between it taking eight games for Eberflus to start Donovan Ezeiruaku, and Schottenheimer scheming plays for KaVontae Turpin instead of Ryan Flournoy, Cowboys fans are hopeful that the bye week served as a wake-up call for Dallas’ defensive and offensive play-callers.
Monday night’s game against the Raiders will tell us all we need to know in that regard. In the meantime, Schottenheimer has confirmed that one of the Cowboys’ most expensive players, $82.5 million right tackle Terence Steele, might be watching from the bench at Allegiant Stadium.
Schottenheimer said that there is an open competition at right tackle this week, per Calvin Watkins of the Dallas Morning News.
Cowboys might bench struggling RT Terence Still in Week 11
For as formidable as Steele has been in the run game, he has been a turnstile in pass protection. That, unfortunately, has been a theme for Steele over the last couple of seasons.
Steele’s 25 pressures allowed are tied for the ninth-most among offensive tackles who’ve played at least 350 pass-blocking snaps, per Pro Football Focus. He’s tied for sixth with 20 pressures allowed in true pass sets, his four sacks are tied for the 10th-most at the position, and his 51.5 pass-blocking grade in true pass sets ranks 38th out of 43 qualified tackles.
Those numbers are damning, but the eye test has been worse with Steele. If not for Dak Prescott’s masterful pocket awareness and footwork, we could be talking about Steele having allowed seven or eight sacks on the season. There have been far too many reps where Steele has gotten beaten without so much as putting a hand on the opposing defender.
Second-year man Nate Thomas would be next up if Steele gets benched. The Cowboys quietly benched Steele in Week 9 against the Cardinals, and it was Thomas who subbed in.
Thomas struggled mightily, allowing five pressures and a sack in 18 pass-blocking snaps. Cardinals edge rusher Josh Sweat gave him fits, but Thomas showed a lot of promise earlier in the year when he filled in for Tyler Guyton at left tackle. In two games (45 pass-blocking snaps), the 24-year-old allowed just three pressures and one sack.
A seventh-round pick in 2024, Thomas impressed the Cowboys a lot in the offseason with how he rehabbed from a knee injury that shelved him for his entire rookie year. He practiced with the first-team offense for the majority of training camp after Guyton went down, and he didn’t look out of place.
Even if Steele gets the nod this week, it feels like Dallas will insert Thomas into the starting lineup sooner rather than later.
