The Dallas Cowboys are either going to be NFC East champions, or one of the teams in the bottom half of the NFL. Which one will be determined over the course of the last three weeks of this topsy-turvy 2019 NFL season. Sitting with a 6-7 record courtesy of four wins against their miserable division, the Dallas Cowboys are tied with the Philadelphia Eagles.
By virtue of their head-to-head victory earlier in the year, Dallas could conceivably win the division with just seven wins. In fact, Dallas could lose this week against the Los Angeles Rams, the Week 16 tilt against the Eagles and still win the division if they beat the Washington Redskins in Week 17 and the Eagles lose their two non-Cowboys games.
With such a wide range of possible season-record outcomes, Dallas in turn has a wide range of draft order scenarios as well. The 20 teams which do not qualify for the playoffs are put in order from worst record to best, with any similar record ties broken by each team’s strength of schedule. The worst a strength of schedule, the better the draft slot. Each playoff team is sorted by round they lose, and any ties there are sorted by winning percentage, and then again by strength of schedule.
Entering Week 15, by virtue of their tiebreaker advantage, Dallas has the NFC East lead and therefore is drafting No. 21.
The Eagles, sitting at 6-7 with an opponents SOS of .582, are at No. 13.
If everything else in the league plays out as it currently stands (it won’t) but the Eagles overtake the Cowboys, that’s the spot in the draft order Dallas would fall into.
The tiebreaker difference is a matter of 8 draft slots, and theoretically the difference between grabbing a player with a first-round grade and a second; most drafts contain 18-20 prospects who are graded as first-round talents even though there are 32 picks in the round.
To make matters more interesting, there are four teams with five wins sitting right atop the Eagles’ current spot. It’s not out of the question if one of the two NFC East teams loses out, they then jump those clubs and could move all the way up to 8th or 9th in the 2020 NFL draft order.
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