Dallas Cowboys wide receiver Ryan Flournoy catches the ball at training camp at the River Ridge Fields. Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

Cowboys 2nd-year WR made 53-man roster after 'dominating' on special teams

Originally posted on Dallas Cowboys on SI | By Tyler Reed | Last updated Aug 27, 2025 3:00 PM ET

The Dallas Cowboys had to make some difficult decisions on Tuesday to trim their roster down to 53 players for the regular season.

One of the positions that everyone was interested in seeing when the official roster cuts were released was the wide receiver unit.

Beloved UDFA Traeshon Holden and third-year receiver Jalen Brooks were officially cut. On the other side of that bad news, second-year wide receiver Ryan Flournoy earned a spot on the 53-man roster.

When speaking about the decision to keep Flournoy on the regular season roster, head coach Brian Schottenheimer had huge praise for the receiver.

"Over the past two or three weeks, I would say there's been no one that has played special teams more dominant than Ryan Flournoy," said Schottenheimer to the official Cowboys website.

"As a gunner he's been unstoppable, and he's done a really good job playing receiver with contested catches versus press release."

It appears the rookie head coach had his reasons for going with Flournoy over Brooks, in what is a crowded yet talented unit at wide receiver.

Having a strong special teams unit is often forgotten. Flournoy may not be able to find a lot of targets on offense, but he could win over everyone with strong play on special teams.