ESPN's 2025 NFL predictions makes intriguing statement about Cowboys
With the conclusion of the 2024 season and the requisite championship parade, the NFL world is ready to move on to bigger and better things. The chase for SuperBowl LX has begun and to kick things off, ESPN's collection of analysts weighed in with their early thoughts about how things are going to shake out.
13 NFL experts were asked for their predictions about a wide variety of topics, including which two teams would represent their conferences in The Big Game, who would take home the MVP and what teams would breakout in a big way. 65 predictions were made, some with the requisite 'if it isn't X, then Y' double dips and the most interesting thing for fans of the Dallas Cowboys was that they weren't mentioned at all.
Not once. Has the malaise brought on by Jerry Jones' inability to manufacture hope among his team's fanbase finally soured the media from including Dallas in every conversation?
Dallas didn't garner a single thought in the entire lengthy article. There was no wild predictions they would breakout in the first year under head coach Brian Schottenheimer, no mentions of Dak Prescott or Micah Parsons as an MVP candidate.
More strangely, when given the opportunity to share one move they'd like to see a team, any team, make this offseason, the Cowboys weren't even thrown a bone in that scenario.
It seems no one has much faith, or interest, in the Cowboys resurrecting themselves in 2025.
Meanwhile, NFC East rivals Philadelphia and Washington, both of whom Dallas will need to overtake within the division, were in predictions left and right. Four analysts had the Super Bowl champions returning to try and defend their title, and two others have penciled Washington in.
That's on the strength of the Commanders young star quarterback Jayden Daniels, who was predicted by three different analysts to win MVP. He garnered more votes than both Lamar Jackson and Patrick Mahomes, and obviously three more than Prescott.
Shipping WR Tee Higgins with Daniels came up a couple times in moves the analysts would love to see happen, but there was no such love for getting Prescott a weapon to add onto CeeDee Lamb. It seems there's not much belief in the Cowboys making a stunning offseason move.
And that runs in parralel to many offseason prediction lists so far this month, which rarely if ever attach one of the bigger name free agents heading to Dallas. Instead, most of those center around where Osa Odighizuwa would fit, or where Zack Martin might land if he doesn't retire. Some even speculate where Parsons might get traded to.
All in all, this is just another reminder that, at least for now, no one is buying anything Jones and company are selling about the 2025 Cowboys.
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