Cowboys defensive end DeMarcus Lawrence had surgery on his broken foot earlier today, according to head coach Mike McCarthy (Twitter link via Todd Archer of ESPN.com). The recovery will rule him out for the next 6-8 weeks, but McCarthy believes Lawrence will be back before the season is through.
The Cowboys have placed Lawrence on IR. The league’s short-term IR allows players to return after as little as three missed games, though the Cowboys won’t see Lawrence until November, at the earliest.
“Obviously, losing DeMarcus, he’s a prime-time player for us. I thought he had a nice start in Tampa,” McCarthy said. “You hate to see these injuries to any of your guys, but what it does is it gives opportunities to the other players. How we will spread that out will be done through game plan. We’ll work on that today, tomorrow and Saturday. Specifically, we’ll get into that when we play the game.”
In the near term, they’ll have to get by without Lawrence and possibly Randy Gregory after his positive COVID-19 test. Dallas was already in an iffy spot with their D-Line — they were just one of two NFL teams without a sack in Week 1. That leaves them with less appealing options, such as Dorance Armstrong and Tarell Basham, backed by reserve DEs Bradlee Anae and Chauncey Golston.
Lawrence, a two-time Pro Bowler, notched 25 sacks between 2017 and 2018. He hasn’t approached that production since, but he was still solid in 2019 and 2020, collecting 11.5 sacks and 26 QB hits in 32 games (31 starts). From his sole game this year, he’s got five tackles and one forced fumble.
Cowboys are done, another wasted season of Dak.
Glad he cashed in a year or 2 ago.
Cowboys have no depth. They have a bunch of star players, or players that get paid like stars, then a bunch of arena football players. Really poor roster composition. Comes down to Stephen Jones being a terrible GM. Simple as that.
Cowboys are such a bizarre team. They have some stars but Jerry overpays for average players and refuses to build a defensive secondary.
They completely ignore the defensive line and secondary then wonder why they can’t stop the run or the pass. It’s hilarious. They’re going to be fun to watch this year because every game will be a shootout.
Spot on. They run their team like a fantasy team. Load up on RB first, then QB, stack WR’s and worry about Defense and Kicking at the very end
Shoot, if Greg Zurlein is at the very end, then that is a steal!