{"id":427257,"date":"2026-09-05T15:58:09","date_gmt":"2026-09-05T15:58:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/427257\/"},"modified":"2026-09-05T15:58:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-05T15:58:09","slug":"dallas-cowboys-season-opener-recent-history-makes-predictions-hard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/427257\/","title":{"rendered":"Dallas Cowboys season opener recent history makes predictions hard"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">We have reached the single digits. There are now fewer than 10 days separating us from the 2026 season beginning for the Dallas Cowboys.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">This one kicks off on the road against the New York Giants in primetime, and the moment it begins everything we have thought about this team for most of the calendar year is suddenly subject to change both positively and negatively.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">It is only one game, but the season opener can often feel bigger than that. If your team wins it then they have started stacking things together. That is one fewer win necessary to reach certain points like double-digits or securing the division. You get the picture.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">This year the Cowboys have a more-important-than-normal game to start the season as it is against a division rival. The Giants have been a bit moribund for a decade now, but that doesn\u2019t change the significance and weight of this being an NFC East matchup. What\u2019s more, it is one of three that Dallas plays on the road across the season at large. It isn\u2019t hyperbole to say that a win would be huge. Given potential tiebreakers down the road that is objectively undeniable.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">Unfortunately for the Cowboys they have a rather meek record in their last 10 season openers, coincidentally (and nicely for symmetry\u2019s sake) this now encompasses the entire Dak Prescott era as he started all of these games.<\/p>\n<p>Last 10 Dallas Cowboys season openers<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">Now fortunately for the Cowboys, 75% of their four wins in this span came against the G-Men specifically. They did lose one though, the first start that Dak ever made (why didn\u2019t Terrance Williams get out of bounds?).<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">Also, nothing about what happened in any of these season-openers has anything to do with, for the most part, who the 2026 Cowboys are. This is an entirely different team, and that goes for the Giants as well.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">In fact this is arguably the most unpredictable Giants team that the Cowboys have faced throughout the Prescott era where they have dominated their rivals. Dallas did see Jaxson Dart in last year\u2019s season finale, but that was a meaningless game as both teams were already eliminated from playoff contention. Plus, John Harbaugh is now in tow as well.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">Whatever the case, hopefully the Cowboys can rip off a win and get things started on the right foot. Most people believe they will. But what most people believe is hardly ever a guarantee.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We have reached the single digits. There are now fewer than 10 days separating us from the 2026&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":427258,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[102,669,104,103],"class_list":["post-427257","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-dallas","tag-dallas","tag-dallas-cowboys-roster","tag-dallas-headlines","tag-dallas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/427257","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=427257"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/427257\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/427258"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=427257"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=427257"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=427257"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}