This story was originally published by Dead Spin
The Dallas Cowboys beat the New York Giants on Thursday Night Football, but it might have cost them star pass rusher Micah Parsons.
On Friday, Parsons was officially diagnosed with a high ankle sprain that caused him to miss the end of Thursday night’s showdown. Typically, even a player of Parsons’ ilk will miss some time due to a high ankle sprain. And that’s very bad news for the Cowboys.
Dallas has two games before their bye week. That’s the good news here. They will travel to play the undefeated Pittsburgh Steelers at Acrisure Stadium on Sunday Night Football next week. Then, before their bye week, they will host Dan Campbell’s Detroit Lions.
After the bye week, they’ll hope to have Parsons back to face the San Francisco 49ers on October 27th’s Sunday Night Football.
To make matters worse, the Cowboys will also be without defensive end DeMarcus Lawrence, who exited Thursday night’s game with a foot injury. According to reports, Lawrence is expected to miss multiple weeks due to that injury.
So now, you can subtract two of the best defenders from a defense that already has struggled mightily at times throughout the young NFL season. Uh oh.
The Cowboys are 2-2, with victories against the Giants and Cleveland Browns, but without Parsons wreaking havoc on opposing quarterbacks, Mike Zimmer’s defense might be in a world of hurt. They were lucky to snag two wins against a flailing Deshaun Watson and Daniel Jones, but their schedule only gets tougher.
Before their game on Thursday night, the Cowboys came into Week 4 with the No. 25 ranked defense in the league. There’s only 32 teams.
Holding Jones and the Giants to 15 points will likely help their ranking stacked up across the league, but their outlook is bleak without two of the top pass rushers in football.
Availability has never been an issue for Parsons in Dallas. In his first three NFL seasons, he’s yet to miss a single game. He already has 41.5 career sacks, but the Cowboys will greatly miss his ability to pressure opposing quarterbacks, draw double teams and make life easier for the rest of the unit.
In a season where the Philadelphia Eagles reloaded by adding Saquon Barkley and the Washington Commanders finally have a pulse with Jayden Daniels, the Cowboys will feel pressure to scrape together at least one victory without Parsons before the much-needed early bye week.
