Cowboys won’t force pick at No. 12, feel ‘confident’ taking best player available
With the NFL draft less than a month away, the Dallas Cowboys are putting the finishing touches on entering draft weekend with the anticipation of making 10 selections across three days from the pool of available college talent.
Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, executive vice president Stephen Jones and head coach Brian Schottenheimer were at the NFL League Meeting to discuss potential strategies entering the draft.
Picking at No. 12 for the first time since 2021 when the team selected Micah Parsons, the Cowboys will be looking to get an impact player with their first-round selection that can step in an provide an immediate presence in 2025.
“You’re always looking for game changers when you’re picking 12th,” Schottenheimer said. “We don’t want to ever pick 12th again, let’s be honest. You’re looking for guys that influence the game. How do you influence the game? You rush the quarterback and you get sacks, strip sacks, fumbles, whatever it is. You score touchdowns.”
As positional value continues to be a hot topic around draft time about if certain positions such as running back, tight end or safety should be avoided with such a premium first-round pick, the Cowboys have direct recent history in being a part of that conversation. In 2016, the team drafted running back Ezekiel Elliott with the fourth overall pick, and despite Elliott having a productive career for Dallas, the debate about that pick being a wise one still exists.
With another need for an early round running back heading into the 2025 NFL Draft nine years later, the Cowboys are not writing off any position group if a player is there at No. 12.
“There can be exceptions at any position,” Jerry Jones said. “We had no plans to draft a tweener between a linebacker and a pass rusher [in 2021]. Micah Parsons got there...Frankly, we were a little light in our evaluation of CeeDee [Lamb in 2020] just because we thought if he were there, we’d go there.”
“That’s just what the draft is. You are sitting there and you get an opportunity that if you’re doing your job, you thought about all opportunities, you looked around the corners on your roster now and years to come. So all of those things pretty much make it a wide open position to draft [any] player.”
In the 2025 draft class, Star-Telegram sources across the league have anywhere from 23 to 30 draftable running backs this year, making it one of the deeper cycles of the last decade for the position. That depth is realized by Dallas as well.
“I think what’s been proven over the course of the last 8 to 10 years is the depth and the ability to find [running] backs late make it to where it’s not a priority [in early rounds],” Schottenheimer said. “But we’re going to look at best player available, and if the best player is a running back, and we feel like that’s a great fit, we should do it.”
And if the Cowboys don’t find a running back early in the draft, or at all like they did in 2024 when they desperately needed to add one, there is a confidence in the two veterans they signed in free agency in Javonte Williams and Miles Sanders.
“We like the two running backs we signed in free agency,” Stephen Jones said. “We’ll see if there is a young back there as well that can help us in the draft, we’re certainly wide open to that. Just see what comes our way.”
When looking at early round picks and where impact players could be most efficient, Schottenhiemer communicated a philosophy of trying to find players that are isolated on the outside.
“I look at it this way, you build it from the outside in,” he said. “So, you got corners, receivers, they get isolated one-on-one. Pass rushers, tackles, they get isolated one-on-one, and then obviously the quarterback position. When you’re building a roster, kind of think of it from building it from outside in, based on guys that get isolated a lot. Because when you’re isolated and you can’t help, it’s a pretty daunting task sometimes.”
Even though Schottenheimer and both Joneses communicated that the team is not done in free agency, multiple holes will most likely need to be addressed going into draft weekend. Cornerback, wide receiver, running back and defensive tackle jump out as positions of need. In Dallas’ eyes, there is depth in the class that it will be able to take advantage of with its 10 selections.
“This draft let’s us have a lot of flexibility,” Jerry Jones said. “Our roster and where we are in the roster gives a lot of flexibility at every position...I like the numbers in the areas that are particularly important to us.”
“I think there’s a lot of depth on the defensive line,” Schottenheimer said. “Both interior and on the edge. I think there’s a lot of depth obviously with the running back position.”
The Cowboys coaching staff and personnel department will get into the weeds of their draft meetings in the coming weeks. After hosting prospects in the team facility over the course of the next few days, Schottenheimer and his staff will begin to nail down final evaluations heading into draft weekend.
“I feel like we go into this draft with a lot of confidence,” he said. “I do feel like we’ve set ourselves up going into the draft where [if] we’re sitting in a certain spot, that’s the best player available, let’s go take him.”
