This is going to be an elite secondary next season. The Dallas Cowboys have made a huge move to improve an already decent secondary into one of the best in the NFL as they acquired Stephon Gilmore from the Colts.
What a fantastic move this was for the Cowboys…which is kind of surprising as Jerry Jones is infamous for ignoring the free agent/trade markets during the offseason.
Giving up just a 5th round pick for a 5X Pro Bowler, 2X All-Pro, former AP Defensive Player of the Year, and a Super Bowl Champion in Stephon Gilmore is the steal of the offseason thus far.
Sure, Gilmore is now on the wrong side of 30 (he’s 32) and was a part of a defense that ranked in the Bottom-5 for points allowed (427) and the Bottom-12 in rushing yards allowed (2,109), but the Colts actually had the 12th best pass defense (3,569 yards allowed) in all of the NFL last season.
Remember, this team finished with an atrocious 4-12-1 record, two head coaches were released (Frank Reich, Jeff Saturday) by the end of the year, the team started three quarterbacks (Matt Ryan, Sam Ehlinger, Nick Foles), all three of those quarterbacks have now either been released or are backups/3rd stringers, and the team is picking 4th overall at the 2023 NFL draft.
Plus, only their divisional rival Houston Texans had a worst record in the AFC (3-13-1) than the Colts last season.
So, in other words, the Colts defensive secondary had no business being one of the Top-15 best defensive units in football, and a large part of the reason why was due to Stephon Gilmore’s play.
Again, he’s not a Defensive Player of the Year CB anymore, but he still was able to rack up 66 tackles (a career high), 53 solo tackles (a career high), 11 passes defended (his most since 2019), and 2 interceptions (with one of those being a game-saving pick against the Broncos in Week 5).
These are really good stats for a 32-year-old CB on the 4th worst team in the NFL, which is why Jerry Jones and the Cowboys have taken a chance on the former Patriot.
Along with resigning safety Donovan Wilson to a 3-year, $24M deal earlier today, the Cowboys now have a secondary that consists of Trevon Diggs, Wilson, Malik Hooker, DaRon Bland, Jourdan Lewis, Anthony Brown, Jayron Kearse, and Gilmore. That’s an outstanding backfield that very well could win the Cowboys the NFC East division title and perhaps a trip to the Conference Championship game.
Okay, I know that the Cowboys and Conference Championship game should never go together in the same sentence, but this very well could be the year that breaks the curse. Obviously, the 49ers and Eagles (both of whom lost key players this free agent market) will still be in contention for the NFC Crown, but who else is there?
The Rams are retooling, the Vikings were last year’s biggest pretenders (they won 11 one-score games), the Lions, Commanders, and Giants are still a few years away from contention, the Green Bay Packers will fall off the map if Rodgers retires/leaves (which he most certainly will do one or the other), the Saints are okay with Carr at the helm, the Bucs will dramatically fall off in the wake of Tom Brady’s retirement, and the Seahawks are an 9-8/8-9 kind of team.
In terms of their chances at making the NFC Championship game, the Cowboys haven’t had better odds since their Super Bowl winning years of the 1990’s. That’s how thin the NFC competition is shaping out to be this season.
So, with most of the Cowboys free agents all but signed up (Wilson resigned, Vander Esche resigned, franchise tagged Tony Pollard), this Gilmore deal really could push the Cowboys over their 30+ Conference Championship game curse as long as nothing else goes wrong.
But that’s never happened in Dallas, right?
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