Dak Prescott has plenty to work with in Dallas, but the Cowboys’ season still comes back to one glaring question: who is protecting his blind side?
On paper, the 2026 Cowboys look built to score. Dallas is bringing back all 11 offensive starters, with CeeDee Lamb, Javonte Williams and a young interior line anchored by Tyler Smith, Cooper Beebe and Tyler Booker. Brian Schottenheimer is in place as head coach, Klayton Adams is coaching the offensive line, and Prescott is heading into his 11th professional season with a chance to push for the kind of year that would wipe away the sting of back-to-back seasons without a deep playoff run.
But all of that firepower can only travel as far as the left tackle spot allows.
That job is still unsettled as training camp operations get ready to open in California at the end of the month. The Cowboys have narrowed it to a two-man battle between former 2024 first-round pick Tyler Guyton and seventh-round developmental tackle Nate Thomas.
Schottenheimer made it clear during OTAs earlier this summer that nothing is being handed out. "We're gonna make Tyler earn it," Schottenheimer stated to reporters, a line that underscored just how open the competition remains.
Guyton has the résumé edge with 21 career starts, but last season was rough from start to finish. He allowed 31 pressures and six hits on the quarterback across 648 snaps, and the problems didn’t stop there. A bad knee injury wrecked his training camp, a high ankle sprain cut his season short, and he eventually lost the starting job late in the year when Tyler Smith had to slide over from guard to help stabilize things.
Thomas, meanwhile, is hardly a comforting fallback. Pro Football Focus ranked him near the bottom of the league, which is why the Cowboys’ left tackle situation has become such a central concern.
Albert Breer of Sports Illustrated put it plainly, writing, "If Brian Schottenheimer and Klayton Adams can make that spot a strength, then the line can be the team’s foundation, and Dak Prescott will have everything he needs around him to have a career year."
That’s the equation in Dallas: a roster that looks loaded enough for Prescott to post MVP-level numbers, and one unresolved spot that could determine how far any of it actually goes. With a massive Week 1 game coming fast, the Cowboys need an answer, and they need it soon.
In Other News...
Jerry Jones Is Already Facing Heat Over One Cowboys Defensive Call
The Cowboys decision to move on from Osa Odighizuwa is already drawing scrutiny, and it is easy to see why. Dallas has been working to trim salary-cap commitments and stockpile draft capital, and the trade was part of that broader plan while also creating a clearer path for younger defensive linemen to play more. It is the kind of roster-management move that can make sense in the abstract, especially for a team trying to balance present needs with future flexibility.
Still, the reaction has not been uniformly positive, because the choice invites an obvious comparison to Kenny Clark, who remains on the roster. One ESPN analyst questioned whether Dallas may have let the better long-term defensive tackle go, and that kind of second-guessing tends to linger when a front office is trying to sell a move as part of a bigger strategy. For Jerry Jones, the challenge now is not just defending the logic of the trade, but proving the Cowboys got the right side of the defensive line equation. [Read more 🡒]
Cowboys May Already Regret One Offensive Line Depth Decision
The Cowboys decision not to tender Brock Hoffman looked like a routine depth move at the time, but it has taken on a different feel with the interior line picture shifting again. Hoffman had quietly given Dallas useful flexibility as a backup center and guard, the kind of insurance policy teams tend to miss only after it is gone.
Now the concern is less about what Hoffman was then and more about what Dallas has left behind him. With the lines depth chart already thinned, the Cowboys are leaning more heavily on T.J. Bass behind Cooper Beebe, and Hoffmans ability to handle multiple interior spots makes the choice to move on from him look increasingly questionable. [Read more 🡒]
Cowboys Still Have One Line Problem That Could Haunt 2026
The Cowboys spent the offseason reshaping parts of their defense, moving on from Matt Eberflus, bringing in Christian Parker and adding new pieces around that side of the ball. But for all the attention on those changes, the more uneasy question may still be up front on offense, where the tackle spots look awfully familiar and awfully unsettled heading toward the next season.
Tyler Guyton and Terence Steele are still the names most likely to open at tackle, even though neither has given Dallas much reason to feel settled there in recent years. The team did add Drew Shelton as a developmental option, but he is not viewed as someone who can push for a starting job right away, which leaves the Cowboys with more hope than competition at a position group that could end up mattering just as much as any defensive overhaul. [Read more 🡒]