Dallas City News

‘Brings to mind Aaron Donald’ Dallas Cowboys are looking into two of the five riskiest prospects of 2025 NFL Draft – Mauricio Rodriguez, AtoZSports.com

Risk isn’t the Cowboys’ philosophy in free agency, but the draft is a different story.

Now that it’s Top 30 visits season around the NFL, we’re getting a good idea of what positions Dallas wishes to address at the end of the month. Of the 16 reported visits so far, two of them are DT Walter Nolen (Ole Miss) and DL Shemar Stewart (Texas A&M).

These two players have three things in common:

They both play defensive line. They’re both projected first rounders. They’re both on Valentino’s list of five riskiest prospects of the 2025 NFL Draft.

DT Walter Nolen

Why he’s risky: There are moments when watching Walter Nolen on the field brings to mind the dominance of Gerald McCoy or Aaron Donald. At 296 pounds, his speed and agility are striking, often making him appear smaller as he changes directions with an unusual quickness. Teams are banking on these standout traits.

In 2024, Nolen’s performance surged compared to previous years, marked by a significant increase in advanced statistics. His quarterback hurries tripled, and he surpassed his previous best in run stops. However, there remains some skepticism within the league regarding Nolen’s consistency and his drive to achieve his full potential

DL Shemar Stewart

Why he’s risky: Shemar Stewart is an exceptional athlete, becoming one of only three edge rushers in the past 25 years, alongside Myles Garrett and Mario Williams, to run a sub-4.7 40-yard dash, jump at least 40 inches, and achieve a broad jump of at least 117 inches. With an impressive performance at the Senior Bowl, there’s a strong case for him to be a top-five pick in any draft class.

The issue with Stewart isn’t his athleticism; rather, it’s his on-field production. With only 4.5 career sacks and somewhat average pressure statistics over his three years in college, he hasn’t fully utilized his physical abilities during games. His pressure numbers are decent, but a missed tackle rate of 23.5% in 2024 raises concerns.

Saahdiq Charles, Cowboys agree to terms on one-year deal – Tommy Yarrish, DallasCowboys.com

Dallas made a move in free agency to help secure depth on the offensive line.

The Cowboys are continuing to add depth on the offensive line, agreeing to terms on a one-year deal with offensive guard Saahdiq Charles on Wednesday.

Charles, 25, signed a one-year deal with the Tennessee Titans in March of 2024, but unexpectedly retired a few days after the start of training camp for personal reasons. On March 12, he announced that he would be coming out of retirement, and the Titans released him to be a free agent once he was reinstated.

Before he retired, Charles was expected to be the starting right guard for Tennessee, one of the two spots he lined up the most at in his first four NFL seasons with the Washington Commanders. Washington drafted him in the fourth round of the 2020 NFL Draft out of LSU.

In those four seasons with the Commanders, Charles played in 35 games, taking snaps at both left and right guard but took north of 300 more snaps on the left side of the offensive line. It was a kick to the inside from left tackle, his primary position in college.

Injuries have been a limiting factor for Charles in the early stages of his career, as a dislocated kneecap placed him on injured reserve in his first NFL game during his rookie season and spent additional time on IR during the 2022 and 2023 seasons.

In his return to the league, Charles and the Cowboys are hoping to continue to develop his skills at the guard position and hope to keep him healthy, with a 6’4, 320 pound frame being a good starting point with continued development for the position.

NFL insiders reveal ‘smoking gun’ in Patriots Joe Milton trade to Cowboys – Matt Galatzan, Sports Illustrated

Here’s some speculation on why the Patriots may have decided to trade Joe Milton.

The Dallas Cowboys took the league by surprise last week when they traded a fifth-round pick to the New England Patriots for in exchange for quarterback Joe Milton and a seventh-round pick.

In one sense, it was surprising due to the fact that the Cowboys had been looking hard at drafting a backup quarterback after the loss of Cooper Rush. However, it was far more surprising that the Patriots moved on so quickly from Milton, who just wrapped up his rookie season.

However, according to New England Patriots insider Phil Perry, it had more to do with Milton’s desire to unseat Drake Maye as the starter.

“Josh Dobbs and Joe Milton weren’t necessarily fighting for a roster spot,” Perry said. “To me, the smoking gun is the timing of this, and the swiftness and just the firmness of the decision, which is, ‘We’re just not gonna deal with people walking around talking about themselves like they should be the starting quarterback when we have a young player that we believe in.’ That, to me, is really more the issue.”

Perry’s colleague and fellow Patriots insider Tom E. Curran took that narrative a step further, explaining that , Milton’s motivation comes largely two separate factors – his age and his season finale performance against the Buffalo Bills.

In that game, Milton completed 22-of-29 passes for 241 yards and a touchdown, while rushing for another score in a 23-16 win. As a result, he reportedly believed he should have had a chance to unseat Maye as the starter.

“From what we understood, it was more about Milton’s comfort level and self-perception relative to Maye,” Curran said. “He felt that as an older player than Drake Maye (Milton is 25; Maye is 22), he didn’t think that the disparity was that great between the two individuals. And he felt because of the final game of the season (against the Bills), it seems, that, ‘Hey man, maybe I should be getting a crack here.’”

Past/Present: Former Cowboys national scout Drew Fabianich named Senior Bowl executive director – Tommy Yarrish, DallasCowboys.com

Maybe the Cowboys will have an edge at the Senior Bowl.

After longtime executive director Jim Nagy left the position to become the general manager for the University of Oklahoma’s football program, former Cowboys national scout Drew Fabianich has been hired as the new executive director of the Senior Bowl.

Fabianich joined the Cowboys in 2003, where he would go on to spend 18 years of his career as a scout, 14 of them as a national scout. He was responsible for evaluating and helping draft future Cowboys, with 67 Pro Bowls combined between players he drafted during his tenure including stars like DeMarcus Ware, Dez Bryan, Sean Lee, Tyron Smith and more.

Following his time with the Cowboys, he spent the 2022 and 2023 seasons at Auburn and West Virginia, respectively, in the role of general manager and director of scouting at both spots.

Now, Fabianich will scout across the nation for some of the best players to come to Mobile, Alabama and show off their skills in front of hundreds of NFL scouts, general managers and coaches in one of the most important events leading up to the NFL Draft process.