Cowboys Michael Gallup vs. Brandin Cooks: 'Stock Falling'?
The Dallas Cowboys added new help in the receiver group, bringing veteran Brandin Cooks aboard to give Dak Prescott another target ... but how does this alter the unit's pecking order?
Well, it pushes everyone not named CeeDee Lamb downward. While Lamb is the team's clear No. 1 and Cooks is the Cowboys' No. 2, guys like Michael Gallup fall in line somewhere down the depth chart. But this is in some quarters being misconstrued as being a "bad thing'' ... which more than one national outlet using terms like "falling stock.''
"Gallup has been struggling to stay on the field as knee injuries forced him out of eight games in 2021," Fansided wrote. "He returned from the surgery but was visibly slowed down. Gallup didn't look like himself throughout the year and had just 39 receptions for 424 yards and four touchdowns."
All of those numbers and facts are true. Gallup is the first to admit he struggled to acclimate to the game in 2022, a year in which Dallas could've used a second receiver of his quality.
But looking to 2023, here's where the "falling stock'' take falls apart: In 2022, while rehabbing and then nursing himself back, Gallup played 738 snaps. That was of course way behind Lamb at 1,015 snaps. But ... it was also behind Noah Brown, the worker bee who totaled 822 snaps.
So in other words - and in other numbers - Gallup (63 percent of snaps) was already No. 3 behind Brown (71 percent) and Lamb (87 percent)! So if Gallup in 2023 is the Cowboys' third receiver, which is the plan? His status/stock will be the same as it was in 2022.
“It’s different,'' Gallup recently said of his health, with a comment that should also be part of his "stock.'' I feel springy again."
Gallup has reached the 1,000-yard mark once in his career back in 2019; if we're talking about a statistical decline since that time, there is a point to be made. Battling injuries, his production in Dallas hasn't been on a steady incline. It is true that when Dallas gave him his $13 million APY contract a year ago that the expectation would be that he would be WR2. But now, with the ink dry and Gallup feeling "springy''?
Gallup as the No. 3 guy in the Dak Prescott-led "Texas Coast Offense'' isn't a weakness. It's a Cowboys strength.
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