Trey

Lance

Lance got the call for his first start in 28 months after spending the season as the Cowboys’ No. 3 quarterback. He got off to a fast start, tossing a floater to Jalen Tolbert for 31 yards as his first completion. However, the Cowboys offense floundered the rest of the game, failing to finish many drives in an ultimate loss. Lance played four games in 2024, ending his fourth NFL season as a reserve quarterback with 266 passing yards, one interception, and no touchdowns. The Cowboys have decisions to make with their backup quarterback spot as both Lance and Cooper Rush are set to hit free agency. We have only seen one start from Lance in over two years, making it difficult for him to have any sort of fantasy relevancy moving forward.

Rapoport adds that “Cooper Rush may still start” but that Lance will receive “some real reps... significant reps in this game.” Following the NFL Network segment, Rapoport captioned his post on X, saying, from “2022 through 17 weeks of 2024, Trey Lance has thrown a grand total of 20 passes. He may eclipse that total on Sunday.” Significant reps, indeed. Lance could scramble his way to back-end QB1 results if he is allowed to dropback 20-plus times. He is difficult to fully rely on though, particularly if he is not even guaranteed to be the starter.

Jones said earlier in the week that he doesn’t think Trey Lance will start in Week 18 but declined to say anything about the situation on Friday. It would be a tough blow to the pockets of Cooper Rush, who is due a $250K incentive if he plays on 55 percent or more of the Cowboys’ snaps this season. Rush has currently played on 52.3 percent of the team’s offensive snaps this season, and could presumably hit his incentive mark with a full assortment of snaps on Sunday.

“I thought for the most part we did some good things out there, I still believe [Cooper Rush] gives us our best chance,” Jones added. Lance is counting down the final days of his rookie contract. He’ll probably get another backup job somewhere next year, and he’s still only 25, but it’s hard to spin “not being able to beat out Cooper Rush” as a positive on the open market.

As Jones pointed out in his weekly interview, the most important thing is winning, not evaluating. Rush, who had one of the worst quarterback performances in modern NFL history in Week 10, threw for 354-1-1 in Week 11 on 55 pass attempts. There’s a strong push from fans and media for the Cowboys to start Lance, the former No. 3 overall pick in the 2021 NFL Draft, but sitting at 3-7, the Cowboys are still focused on winning games. There’s a good chance we’ll see Lance at some point this season, but Dallas is clearly prepared to lean into Rush for at least one more week against the Commanders. We’ll see if Sunday’s performance changes any minds heading into Week 13.

But there will also be a package of plays for Trey Lance. Ultimately this may make neither player superflex viable if they are splitting into each other’s time. Only truly desperate times would call for starting either player against a Commanders defense that is on the upswing in Week 12.

McCarthy told reporters after the game that he should have allowed Lance to run the offense near the end of the blowout loss. “I could’ve gotten him a series. That’s one thing that I would second-guess myself on,” McCarthy said. “I didn’t want to get into putting him in for a play or two, because he’s more than a gadget player in my opinion. We had him prepared to take a series, and frankly there at the end I should’ve gave him that series, and I regret not doing that.” With the Dallas offense going nowhere under backup QB Cooper Rush, Lance could see opportunities down the stretch. The dual-threat Lance should be rostered in superflex formats just in case.

Prescott’s recovery time is expected to be about three months after his procedure to repair a partial avulsion of the hamstring tendon. Prescott and the team sought several medical opinions over the past week but were left with no choice but to go the surgical route. The Cowboys’ season is over, and with it, the Mike McCarthy era has likely reached its end. Some combination of Trey Lance and Cooper Rush will fill in for Prescott as Dallas plays out the stretch. Lance could have some deep league appeal due to his rushing. CeeDee Lamb, who caught six of 10 targets for 21 yards in Week 10 against the Eagles, becomes a borderline WR2 option with Prescott out.

The Cowboys deployed the “Trey Lance Package” late in the third quarter, but the former No. 3 overall pick permanently replaced Cooper Rush in the fourth quarter with the game well out of reach. Lance struggled, to say the least. He took a sack on his first official dropback, and on his second drive of the quarter, he threw an interception to C.J. Gardner-Johnson, giving the Cowboys their fifth turnover on the night. Lance would take another sack on his third and final drive, just for good measure. The Cowboys are 3-6 and already looking at a lost season. While it seems unlikely that Lance would get the start in Week 11 against the Texans, it wouldn’t be surprising if we saw him at some point before the year is up.

Dallas traded a fourth-round pick for Lance just before the start of the 2023 season. He has yet to take a snap for the team. With Dak Prescott out, it’s now or never for them to get a look at what he can do. Cooper Rush is slotted in as the starter, but it makes sense for Lance to see some niche work as the cowboys shift into evaluation mode.