signed<\/a>)<\/p>\nHoldovers
Quinnen Williams – 303 lbs
Kenny Clark – 314 lbs
Jay Toia – 342 lbs<\/p>\n
Notice a trend? The Cowboys kept all of their beefiest DLs and added another Paunch Burger in Ogbonnia from the Chargers. Maybe it\u2019s just a coincidence, but let\u2019s go a little deeper here.<\/p>\n
Yes, Dallas got a third-round pick back for Odighizuwa. That\u2019s not too shabby any year, and especially given that the Cowboys had no Day 2 picks before the deal. It\u2019s even more profitable if they didn\u2019t see Odighizuwa as a great fit anymore with the scheme Parker plans to run. The reported 3-4 move would hurt Odighizuwa: small for a 3-4 DE and not athletic enough to move to OLB. Even if Dallas found creative ways to involve him, is that the best use of what would\u2019ve been nearly $20 million of the salary cap?<\/p>\n
As for the lesser moves, Solomon Thomas has 3-4 experience from his time in Robert Saleh\u2019s defenses, which he\u2019s returning to in Tennessee. Perrion Winfrey didn\u2019t, and he\u2019s still a bit undersized for the 3-4 DE role. We scratched our heads when Winfrey was released just before free agency began, but it makes more sense after Odighizuwa\u2019s and Thomas\u2019 exits. The pattern is fairly clear, and it points back to Parker.<\/p>\n
As we all know, Parker came from the Eagles. A quick glance at his last stop also helps us see what he\u2019s working towards in Dallas. The Eagles\u2019 starting defensive linemen last year were:<\/p>\n
Jordan Davis – 336 lbs
Jalen Carter – 314 lbs
Moro Ojomo – 292 lbs<\/p>\n
Again, see the trend? Even the smallest guy, Ojomo, still had 12 pounds on Odighizuwa. And while all of these weights are only what we can gather from teams\u2019 official websites, and probably aren\u2019t entirely accurate, there\u2019s still enough in these numbers to draw a conclusion.<\/p>\n
Of course, size isn\u2019t everything. Body types, where guys carry their weight, how much power they generate behind that mass: many things decide actual on-field effectiveness. But as we\u2019re trying to figure out who Christian Parker is, this is quickly becoming a way to identify players he might value over others. Size seems to matter more at DT in his scheme, not just because it\u2019s a 3-4 but also the particular way he wants to run it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wednesday was the official start of NFL free agency, but the Cowboys\u2019 biggest news came in the trade…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":738491,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2066],"tags":[230,229,257,5355,438,2461,7,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-808354","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-dallas-cowboys","8":"tag-cowboys","9":"tag-dallas","10":"tag-dallas-cowboys","11":"tag-dallas-cowboys-free-agency","12":"tag-dallas-cowboys-roster","13":"tag-dallascowboys","14":"tag-football","15":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116216941125555608","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/808354","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=808354"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/808354\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/738491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=808354"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=808354"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=808354"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}