You’ll never guess who leads all Dallas Cowboys players in preseason snaps
You’ve read the title of this post, so you might think the Cowboys’ leader in preseason snaps is some down-roster player you probably haven’t heard much of. But are you sure?
Do you think you can guess which position that player is playing without reading on?
Perhaps it’s one of the rookie linemen who’s been forced to play extra snaps because of injuries to Sam Williams and Chuma Edoga? Maybe a defensive back who has gotten a ton of snaps because the Cowboys are sitting their starters? Perhaps it’s a down-roster linebacker subbing in for one of the starters? Or one of the wide receivers whose name we still haven’t quite internalized?
It’s definitely not a running back, and it’s certainly not a fullback.
The player leading the Cowboys in preseason snaps is QB Trey Lance, with 116 snaps over two games (65 snaps on offense in week 1, 51 in week 2). Lance just edged out OT Matt Waletzko, who has tallied 112 snaps so far.
Whether playing a lot of snaps has any correlation to a 53-man roster spot remains to be seen. But in any case, here are the top 12 players as ranked by total snaps on offense or defense, a list heavy with defensive backs and offensive linemen:
| Most regular snaps | ||||
| Name | POS | Regular Snaps | ||
| Trey Lance | QB | 116 | ||
| Matt Waletzko | T | 112 | ||
| Kemon Hall | CB | 100 | ||
| Josh Butler | CB | 89 | ||
| Asim Richards | G | 85 | ||
| Justin Rogers | DT | 82 | ||
| Cooper Beebe | G | 78 | ||
| T.J. Bass | G | 75 | ||
| Josh DeBerry | DB | 75 | ||
| Juanyeh Thomas | FS | 75 | ||
| Markquese Bell | FS | 75 | ||
| Viliami Fehoko | DE | 75 | ||
That picture changes a bit when we look at the top 20 players by total snaps. Trey Lance loses his top spot, but that’s not the most surprising thing about this table.
| Most total snaps | |||||
| Name | POS | Experience | Regular Snaps | ST snaps | Total |
| Matt Waletzko | T | 2 years | 112 | 10 | 122 |
| Trey Lance | QB | 3 years | 116 | 0 | 116 |
| Kemon Hall | CB | 5 years | 100 | 12 | 112 |
| Josh Butler | CB | 1 year | 89 | 15 | 104 |
| Asim Richards | G | 1 year | 85 | 10 | 95 |
| Cooper Beebe | G | Rookie | 78 | 9 | 87 |
| Josh DeBerry | DB | Rookie | 75 | 12 | 87 |
| Justin Rogers | DT | Rookie | 82 | 3 | 85 |
| T.J. Bass | G | 1 year | 75 | 10 | 85 |
| Juanyeh Thomas | FS | 2 years | 75 | 8 | 83 |
| Markquese Bell | FS | 2 years | 75 | 7 | 82 |
| Viliami Fehoko | DE | 1 year | 75 | 5 | 80 |
| Julius Wood | DB | Rookie | 72 | 7 | 79 |
| Josh Ball | T | 3 years | 65 | 10 | 75 |
| Eric Scott | CB | 1 year | 64 | 10 | 74 |
| Durell Johnson | DE | 1 year | 64 | 7 | 71 |
| Willie Harvey | LB | 5 years | 60 | 8 | 68 |
| Albert Huggins | DT | 5 years | 67 | 0 | 67 |
| Al-Quadin Muhammed | DE | 7 years | 64 | 2 | 66 |
| Tyrus Wheat | DE | 2 years | 57 | 9 | 66 |
The preseason is usually not the place for veteran players to get a lot of snaps. And when we’ve done similar preseason snap count tallies in the past, the lists were utterly dominated by rookies, but not this year.
What this means is anybody’s guess. Perhaps this year’s rookie class is not quite ready for a high snap count. Perhaps this is a make-or-break preseason for the 1-, 2-, and 3-year veterans on the roster; “prove that you belong or so long”.
And maybe, just maybe, this could be a sign that the depth on the roster is better than expected: Instead on having to rely on a bunch of rookies and UDFAs for depth, the Cowboys’ depth this year has more experience than usual.
Let’s hope it’s the latter. Of course, by themselves preseason snap counts probably don’t mean all that much, but sometimes these snaps can give you an early hint of how the depth chart may be filling out.