2020 POTENTIAL BREAKOUT STARS: NFC EAST PART 1

BY ADAM GREENE

As we turn our attention to the NFC East, there’s plenty of star power already there. The problem is, that talent is primarily locked into two teams; the Dallas Cowboys and Philadelphia Eagles. The Eagles, three years ago, nabbed a Super Bowl Trophy from it. The Cowboys got a bad coach fired and hired one that was even worse.

The other two teams have their own issues, whether it was getting caught up in a wave of social change or the complete mismanagement of an NFL roster that would get you fired from your own Madden 21 franchise.

Either way, we’re going to have new stars come to the fore on these teams this season, so let’s fancy a guess on who they might be.

DALLAS COWBOYS

Wide Receiver CeeDee Lamb

(Rookie)

Lamb steps into what is already a star-studded wide receiver room. Amari Cooper is arguably one of the best in the game and Michael Gallup is coming off his first 1,000 yard season (66 catches for 1,107 yards and six touchdowns to be exact). Lamb was brought in as the team’s No. 3, which would usually be the slot guy, but considering Lamb is taller than both Gallup and Cooper, who knows how they’ll line up on any given play?

It makes you sad they won’t have a more creative or competent playcaller than Mike McCarthy dialing up the offense.

Lamb enters the NFL from Lincoln Riley’s Oklahoma air show after a couple of 1,000 yard seasons of his own. Last year he caught 62 passes for 1,327 yards and a ridiculous 14 touchdowns. He added a rushing TD on the ground.

With tight end Jason Witten leaving the team as a free agent for the Las Vegas Raiders, his 66 catches have to go somewhere and I don’t think his replacement, Blake Jarwin, is the guy. That means plenty of opportunities for Lamb to dazzle if he does nothing more than run Witten’s old TE routes.

NEW YORK GIANTS

Quarterback Daniel Jones
(2019: 61.9 completion percentage, 3,027 yards, 24 touchdowns, 12 interceptions)

Before you roast me for picking Jones, understand the dilemma. Who else was I going to pick? Running back Saquon Barkley is already a star and the rest of the roster is the worst in all of professional football after the CFL cancelled its season.

If Jones isn’t a breakout star for the Giants in 2020, this team is even more a disaster than it already looks on paper. And on paper it’s an 0-16 squad.

Can Jones excel in Jason Garrett’s offense? Tony Romo and Dak Prescott both did. Garrett’s problem was game management and head coaching, something he won’t be doing in New York.

Under Garrett, Romo went to four Pro Bowls and never completed fewer than 61.3 percent of his passes. Prescott went to two Pro Bowls in his four years with Garrett and never completed fewer than 62.9 percent of his passes.

Garrett can do the job. Now Jones has to prove he can too, because he and Barkley are the only thing keeping New York out of the No. 1 pick in the 2021 draft(and helping the team pick his replacement in Trevor Lawrence).

To be continued in Part 2

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