Tyler Smith

No. 73 · 5th season

Tyler Smith is the Cowboys' best answer at left tackle — and he doesn't want the job

There is a version of this offseason where everything works out neatly for the Dallas Cowboys. Tyler Smith slides to left tackle, the line is set, and nobody has to worry. The problem is Tyler Smith.

Smith has built himself into one of the better guards in the league — a Pro Bowl selection at a position he has worked at, settled into, and made his own. That is not a small thing. Guards do not get Pro Bowl nods by accident.

Now the Cowboys are eyeing him as the solution to their left tackle problem. The organization sees the fit. Smith sees it differently. He has said, in terms clear enough to matter, that a permanent move to tackle is not what he wants.

That gap — between what a team needs and what a player has earned the right to want — is where things get uncomfortable. Smith is not refusing to help. He is asking to keep the identity he built. Whether the Cowboys can solve their line problem without asking him to give that up is the question hanging over this whole situation.

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