The Dallas Cowboys are leaning toward carrying five wide receivers, and that projection puts Anthony Smith in line to take the final spot. If that holds, the seventh-round pick out of East Carolina would beat out Camden Brown for the WR5 job as Dallas trims toward its 53-man roster.
That is the kind of competition people are watching now because the Cowboys are still moving through training camp and preseason, and the receiver group is one of the reasons the offense draws so much attention. CeeDee Lamb and George Pickens sit at the top of the depth chart, while Ryan Flournoy and Kavontae Turpin are viewed as roster locks, which leaves one of the few real battles on the team hanging over the last spot.
The case for Smith is not complicated. He has the slight edge for the job because his deep threat ability has shown up, and he has been used in different ways during camp. That matters on a roster that already has enough established options to make the receiver room look deep. With Lamb and Pickens driving the passing game and the rest of the group largely set, the final choice comes down to whether the Cowboys want five receivers or decide to keep six.
Brown is still in the mix after signing as an undrafted free agent out of Georgia Southern, and that is what keeps the spot unsettled. The Cowboys can like Smith’s speed and versatility and still demand more before the decision becomes final, especially since he will have to prove he can help on special teams. That is the part that can separate a fourth or fifth receiver from a player who gets squeezed off the active roster.
So the question is not whether the Cowboys have enough talent at receiver. They do. The question is whether that talent pushes them to carry an extra body or whether the final cut comes down to Smith’s ability to hold off Brown and make his value too hard to ignore when the 53-man roster is set.
