The Dallas Cowboys have their backs against the wall at the moment. But they could flip the tables on the entire NFL with one blockbuster trade.
At 3-3, the Cowboys are on the outside looking in both in the NFC East and the playoff picture at large. But it's still early enough that Dallas controls its own destiny, and with a manageable schedule the rest of the way, there's still time for the Cowboys to become a threat to win the conference.
What's more concerning than the record, however, is the Cowboys' porous defense. They've been blown out on their own home field three times already, and their -42 point differential is the third-worst in the NFC, ahead of only the New York Giants and Carolina Panthers.
Bringing in a top-tier defender would be a huge boost for the Cowboys, but what if they brought in the best defender in the league?
The Cleveland Browns have fallen out of the playoff race already, and trade rumors are swirling around star edge rusher Myles Garrett. Alex Kay of Bleacher Report proposed a trade Tuesday that would send two first-round picks and two third-rounders from Dallas to Cleveland in exchange for the reigning Defensive Player of the Year
"Trading for Myles Garrett—a Dallas native who hoped his hometown club would move up the board to land him back in 2017—won't solve all the Cowboys' ills, but he'd certainly remedy nearly all of the defensive issues this squad is dealing with," Kay said.
"Garrett is not only the splashy, big-name superstar who Dallas ownership prefers to target in trades, but he's also the type of generational talent who could get this team back on track to contend for championships."
Garrett, 29, hardly needs any introduction at this point. He's a three-time first-team All-Pro, he has 92.5 sacks in just 107 career games, and he led all players in Pro Football Reference's Approximate Value stat last season, making him the sport's most "valuable" player of 2023.
It still seems tenuous that the Browns would consider trading Garrett with two years remaining on his contract, but things have gotten astonishingly bad in Cleveland this season. If they do decide to cut bait with their game-changing superstar, the Cowboys would be wise to pounce before one of their competitors does.
