Caleb Downs and Malachi Lawrence Finish Cowboys Debut

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Caleb Downs and Malachi Lawrence Finish Cowboys Debut

Originally posted on Inside The Star | By Mark Heaney | Last updated Aug 16, 2026 11:15 AM ET

In April, Cowboys fans were electrified with their team trading up to select Ohio State superstar Caleb Downs, and saw the team add Central Florida’s highly-touted pass rusher Malachi Lawrence just a few picks later.

Last night, they both made their debuts for Dallas as the organization’s preseason began against Seattle.

The two first-round rookies will have to wait until Week 3 of the preseason (August 28th v. New Orleans) to make their AT&T Stadium debut, but it was fun nonetheless to finally see them take the field for a game, not just practice.

As Brian Schottenheimer confirmed pregame, the two played a very limited number of snaps, and while that should grow over the course of the next few weeks, we can still talk about what we saw from each and what was most important for them last night.

Caleb Downs’s Preseason: Staying Healthy, Moving All Over the Field

Downs in particular saw few snaps on Saturday night, and it should be easy for everybody to understand why: this kid is not your normal rookie; he is going to be the leader of this defense as he roams all over the field this season.

Even if those limited opportunities last night, we saw that come to fruition as Downs found himself in various spots on defense.

Encouraging to see Caleb Downs being moved around.

I still think he’ll start out as their nickel defender once the regular season starts. https://t.co/6RBj0dqKGN

— Marcus Mosher (@Marcus_Mosher) August 16, 2026

For Downs, this is really the goal of the preseason. The more he moves around and gets accustomed to NFL speed, the better he will be in Week 1. If he stays healthy and does this exactly, it will have been a successful preseason for this future All-Pro.

Malachi Lawrence’s Preseason: Show More Potential, Try to Earn Week 1 Snaps

Lawrence, who many fans have noted has had a pretty quiet summer in terms of impact, played 16 snaps last night. In nine pass rushes, he had 2 quarterback pressures. but he was not able to secure either for a sack or tackle.

I was personally hoping to see a bit more of him, as his goal for the preseason should be to show more impressive moments and earn some snaps in Week 1.

In what we have been able to see from the early film to come out, he didn’t look as explosive as you may hope, but he also looked a bit bigger than he did during his college years which seemed to help him against the run.

As August goes by, we should see him slowly get more comfortable with the big leap from UCF to the NFL.

This article first appeared on Inside The Star and was syndicated with permission.

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