Cowboys @ Eagles

Four straight losses, a new quarterback, and the league's worst defense

Monday night in Philadelphia matches two 2 and 4 division rivals, and the winner leaves at 3 and 4. The Eagles have lost four straight for the first time since 2020, and Jalen Hurts has not taken a snap since Week 5: Tanner McKee played all 64 offensive snaps against Carolina and threw 45 passes. Dallas brings the league's worst defense by EPA per play, last in 2025 as well, while the Giants lead the NFC East at 3 and 2 and 1. Since 1999, teams that started 2 and 4 and won their seventh game reached the playoffs 13 times in 72 tries; teams that lost it got there 6 times in 101. So the question for Monday: which of these offenses can exploit the other team's weakest unit?

Both teams lost in Week 6. Philadelphia fell 25 to 14 to Carolina with an offense at minus 0.171 EPA per play, 24th of the 28 teams that played, after plus 0.026 and 16th across 2025. Dallas lost 23 to 13 at Green Bay; Dak Prescott threw 54 passes and two interceptions, and the offense posted minus 0.133 per play, 20th of 28, after plus 0.098 and fifth in 2025. One game each, set beside a full season. The Week 6 injury report listed Hurts Out with a calf injury; neither team has a Week 7 report yet.

Why it matters. The division is open: the Giants lead at 3 and 2 and 1, and nobody else in it is above .500. History says the seventh game matters for a 2 and 4 team, 18.1 percent playoff rate with a win against 5.9 percent with a loss, and the 2021 Eagles are one of the six teams that recovered from 2 and 5. Philadelphia's offense ranks 30th, Dallas's defense ranks 32nd, and every collision below asks which weakness gives first.

The league's worst pass defense meets its second fewest big catches

McKee's second game this season comes against the softest pass defense in football. Dallas allows plus 0.331 EPA per dropback, 32nd of 32 and the ninth worst through six team games of any defense since 1999, and it has given up 22 completions of 20 yards or more, 29th. Philadelphia's passing game sits at minus 0.127 per dropback, 25th, with nine such catches, 31st, and none in Week 4 or Week 6. A.J. Brown, now a Patriot, caught 78 passes for 1,003 yards for the Eagles in 2025; DeVonta Smith leads them this year with 310. If Philadelphia has a completion of 20 yards or more by the end of the first quarter, Dallas is playing to its season form; if it reaches halftime without one, the Eagles are repeating Weeks 4 and 6.

Why it matters. Dallas's pass defense was 31st in 2025 at plus 0.221 per dropback and is worse in 2026, so its number is a baseline, not a slump. Philadelphia's passing was 13th in 2025 at plus 0.044 and has fallen to 25th, with Weeks 3 and 4 doing the most damage. Big plays are the cleanest test of which side gives: the Eagles have the second fewest, and Dallas allowed eight in one game at Houston.

Prescott has been sacked seven times. Philadelphia's pass rush ranks 31st

Dallas protects its passer better than anyone, and Philadelphia's pass rush is nearly the least likely to change that. Dak Prescott has been sacked 7 times on 256 dropbacks, a 2.7 percent rate that ranks first, and he is fourth in the league with 1,639 passing yards, with CeeDee Lamb third in receiving yards at 577. The Eagles sack the passer on 3.5 percent of dropbacks, 31st, after 7.2 percent and 13th in 2025; Nolan Smith and Jalen Carter have three each. The pressure point is elsewhere: Prescott threw one interception in Weeks 1 to 4 and four in Weeks 5 and 6. If Philadelphia has not sacked Prescott by halftime, the Eagles need takeaways to get off the field; if Prescott has thrown one by then, Weeks 5 and 6 are carrying over.

Why it matters. Dallas's offense ranks eighth in EPA per play and its protection held Green Bay to one sack on 56 dropbacks while Prescott threw 54 passes. Philadelphia's pass defense ranks 25th per dropback, down from fifth in 2025, and without a pass rush it has to win on the back end. The interceptions are the one 2026 crack in Prescott's line, and two games is a small sample beside four clean ones.

Dallas allows 56.2 percent on third down, tied for fourth worst since 1999

If Philadelphia's offense needs a place to find drives, third down against Dallas is it. The Cowboys have allowed 41 conversions on 73 third downs, 56.2 percent, last in the league and tied for the fourth worst through six team games since 1999; Green Bay went 11 of 18 against them in Week 6. The Eagles convert 37.3 percent, 22nd, and went 0 for 12 against the Rams in Week 4. The other direction tilts toward Dallas: its offense converts 48.6 percent, fourth, against a Philadelphia defense at 40.0 percent, 15th. If the Eagles convert two of their first three third downs, McKee is getting the help the Dallas defense has given everyone; if they go three and out twice in the first quarter, the Week 4 pattern is back.

Why it matters. Dallas's third down defense was 31st in 2025 too, so the 2026 number continues a pattern rather than starting one. Philadelphia's third down offense was 21st in 2025 and is 22nd now, the same middling unit with a different passer. Third down is where extra possessions are won, and Dallas's defense has handed them out every week but two.

The Eagles ran 31 times for 57 yards in two weeks. Dallas allows 4.93 a carry

Philadelphia's run game has gone missing at the worst time, and Dallas's run defense is one of the few that could hand it back. Over Weeks 5 and 6 the Eagles ran 31 times for 57 yards, 1.84 per carry, the lowest of any team in those two weeks, after 4.34 per carry in Weeks 1 to 4. Saquon Barkley, 1,140 yards in 2025, has not carried since Week 4, and the Week 6 injury report listed him Out with a hamstring injury; Dameon Pierce has 23 carries for 49 yards in the two games since. Dallas allows 4.93 yards per carry, 26th, and Tampa Bay ran 37 times for 243 yards against it in Week 5; in Week 6 it held Green Bay to 59 yards on 24 carries, the best of the week. If the Eagles average four yards a carry on first down in the first quarter, McKee can throw on his terms; if they are throwing on first down by the second quarter, Dallas's Week 6 run defense came with it.

Why it matters. Without a run game Philadelphia puts the game on McKee's arm in his second 2026 start, which happens to be where the Dallas defense is weakest; with one, the Eagles can shorten the game against an offense that ranks eighth. Dallas's run defense was 27th in yards per carry in 2025, so its Week 6 against Green Bay is the outlier, one game beside a full season of the other kind.