Blogging The Boys
How likely is it for the Cowboys to land a quality wide receiver in the first round in your opinion?
The Dallas Cowboys currently have the 12th overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft. There are a lot of directions the team can go with this pick, but looking at what the team has done (or not done) in free agency, a case can be made that they could be targeting a wide receiver in the first round.
Multiple receivers have been mocked to the Cowboys in recent predictions. Whether they pick at 12 or move back and pick later, there are some good receivers to choose from. According to NFL Mock Draft Database, there are four receivers projected to go in the first round according to the consensus big board.
9 Tetairoa McMillian, Arizona
20 Matthew Golden, Texas
30 Emeka Egbuka, Ohio State
31 Luther Burden, Missouri
If the Cowboys select a wide receiver in the first round, how likely would they be to pick a good one? That’s hard to say, but let’s see what we can gather by looking at how previous first-round receivers have done over the last five drafts.
Last year’s draft class was deep with wide receivers. Not only did seven receivers go in the first round, but 10 receivers were drafted by the fifth pick in the second round. The receiver with the most yards in their rookie season was Jacksonville’s Brian Thomas who edged out the Giants' Malik Nabers (who missed a couple of games). Los Angeles’ Ladd McConkey was taken with the second pick in the second round and finished with 1,149 yards. Here are last year’s first-round receivers:
Four receivers were taken on Day 1 in 2023 and oddly enough, they all went right after each other. While no one exploded onto the scene, three of the four have been strong contributors. Here are the receivers taken with their corresponding yards (yards from this point on will be yearly averages to compare with other years):
There was one WR selected early in the second round, but we won’t bring him up, although his name rhymes with Donathan Dingo if you like word puzzles.
Six receivers were taken in the first round of 2022. Similar to 2023, there was a run on receivers with all six taken from pick 8 to pick 18. Even though they were all taken near each other, the receivers picked early have outperformed the ones picked behind them in most cases.
Jameson Williams’ numbers would be higher if he hadn’t dealt with injuries as he’s missed almost half of his games so far in his career. Speaking of missing games, Green Bay’s Christian Watson was taken early second round and has flashed at times, but he’s missed time in each of his three seasons in the league.
The 2021 draft featured good receivers taken in the top 10 as LSU’s Ja’Marr Chase was the cream of the crop...
