Mac Engel: At this point, do you want the Cowboys to win and push for the playoffs?

Mac Engel, Fort Worth Star-Telegram on Nov 19, 2025

Published in Football

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FORT WORTH, Texas — The Dallas Cowboys received the needed return on the arrival of new players to their defense, and are now just one game below .500, a good 500 miles away from the playoffs.

By trading for defensive tackle Quinnen Williams and linebacker Logan Wilson, the Cowboys have made the decision to go for the playoffs, despite the odds that say such an achievement will require near perfection for the rest of the season.

They believe they can do here in 2025 what they did in 2018, and use a trade deadline move to propel them to the playoffs.

Do you want them to even bother trying? Considering the state of the NFC, this time it all feels a little too late.

The bad state of the Cowboys’ playoff hopes

In their 33-16 win over the Raiders on Monday night in Las Vegas, the Cowboys again looked good against a bad team. Not that much different than their wins against the New York Jets and Washington Commanders (still an awful name).

The Cowboys are 4-5-1; their four wins are against teams that not only don’t have winning records, but are some of the worst teams in the league. That maddening tie against the Green Bay Packers, and the inexcusable home loss against the Arizona Cardinals, have the potential to haunt this team right out of any chance at a meaningful game in the middle of December.

One detail about the Cowboys over the past 20-plus years is their consistency at being around the chance to make the playoffs. They don’t do much in January, but since Bill Parcells arrived as head coach in 2003, the Cowboys nearly always make December interesting.

Unlike those previous seasons, however, the Cowboys picked a bad year to hope 8-8-1 will cut it to make the postseason. A 9-7-1 record probably won’t do it, either.

After their blowout win in Vegas, the Cowboys are now all the way up to 10th place in the NFC. That’s 10th, as in, “You can’t be serious?”

Why the Cowboys should go for it

The wiser decision for the Cowboys would have been to sell their attractive assets at the trade deadline, but when the owner is Jerry Jones, there is always a chance of striking oil on the surface of the sun.

Had they dealt a player like receiver George Pickens, the Cowboys would have been white-flagging 2025, with their eyes on the 2026 NFL draft.

The Cowboys’ attitude typically is unless they are guaranteed a top-five-to-seven pick, it’s not worth tanking a season. The chances of landing an impact player with the 17th selection aren’t that much different than with the ninth, 10th or 11th. They are normally not bad enough to pick too high in the draft.

On Monday night, what has been an awful defense did welcome the arrival of Williams and Wilson, as well as rookie defensive back Shavon Revel Jr. and linebacker DeMarvion Overshown. The latter two were coming back from injuries sustained last season.

Williams will do what the Cowboys hoped Kenny Clark would provide when they traded Micah Parsons to the Packers back in August. Clark can be solid. Williams is a two-legged monster.

If the Cowboys’ defense can improve to “not terrible,” or even “meh, it’s OK,” the team has the potential to be pretty good. Don’t underestimate the weight the tragic suicide of teammate Marshawn Kneeland will have on the team’s performance.

The Cowboys’ daunting playoff path

The Cowboys can only lose once for the remainder of the season and hope for a playoff spot. Considering their remaining schedule, that’s a big ask of a team that was blown out by the Cardinals.

Beginning Sunday, the Cowboys host the Philadelphia Eagles and Kansas City Chiefs in the span of five days. They also have the Detroit Lions and Los Angeles Chargers, too.

After the team traded for wide receiver Amari Cooper in 2018, they won seven of their final eight games to make the playoffs.

This is not 2018. Their remaining schedule after the Cooper trade that fall featured the division-leading Eagles, twice; the Cowboys won both of those games, a major contributor to reaching the playoffs.

The easiest path to the playoffs is always to win the division, but the Cowboys are four wins behind first-place Philadelphia. The best shot for the Cowboys is to win 10 games, and hope that is good enough for the final wild-card spot.

Because the Cowboys are owned by Jones, they will always go for it.

They are a better team because of the arrival of four players to their defense, but this time it just feels a little too late.

It should make them, however, at least interesting.

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