Dallas Cowboys land a W before even playing in Week 8, but it came at a cost no one wanted to pay

The Dallas Cowboys are set to host the Arizona Cardinals on Monday Night Football, and it's nothing short of a must-win. At 3-4-1, there's not a lot of room for any errors.

Playoff aspirations become tangible at around 10 wins, and even that doesn't get you in guaranteed. The Seattle Seahawks missed the playoffs last season despite a 10-7 record. With a tough stretch of games waiting after the Cowboys' Week 10 bye, urgency is already as high as it will be the rest of the year.

That's also why every little outside result also helps, and why fans should be excited about the Washington Commanders falling to 3-6 following a lopsided 38-14 loss to the Seahawks in Week 9's Sunday Night Football.

Entering Week 9, the Cowboys' playoff chances sat at 17.3%, per FTN. Dallas already sat above the Commanders' odds of 14.5%, though the latter was calculated to have a slightly higher probability of winning the division (likely because they have yet to play the 6-2 Philadelphia Eagles, while Dallas is 0-1 in its series).

Following the Commanders' loss, the Cowboys' playoff chances are almost surely rising. Parlayed with a win on Monday night, things could look slightly better heading into the bye and the trade deadline. We will update this post with their updated odds once FTN updates its odds and DVOA ratings, which work hand in hand.

Now, though a division rival losing will always be beneficial to an NFL team, this one comes at a price no one wants to pay: A seemingly serious injury to the starting quarterback.

Jayden Daniels' arm injury makes it a tough win to celebrate

Despite Daniels being a division rival, you just don't celebrate tough injuries like that taking place. Down 31-7, Daniels should have been out of the game. Instead, he suffered a gruesome left elbow injury and had to exit the game with a cast around his left arm. Both Commanders and Seahawks players were emotional on the field following the injury.

While we don't know the severity of the injury just yet, results should soon emerge following immediate X-rays. Usually, teams run MRIs on injured players the day after the game.

The Cowboys' top concerns in the Wild Card race:

Now, granted, the Cowboys would need the Eagles to collapse to aspire for the top spot in the division.

But the Commanders' loss helps even in the wild-card race. Right now, the Cowboys have to worry about themselves and getting better on defense but below are some of the teams that Dallas needs to worry about. I'm excluding division leaders for now and focusing on NFC teams currently in wild-card territory:

• 5-3 Chicago Bears
• 5-3 Detroit Lions
• 5-4 Carolina Panthers
• 6-2 Los Angeles Rams
• 6-3 San Francisco 49ers

That's excluding three 5+ win teams around the NFC. In other words, it will be a tough postseason ticket to get. But at least, the Commanders' struggles make things relatively easier for Dallas. At the end of the day, there's a lot of teams with a better record than the Cowboys. Removing one from the list helps.

This story was originally published in A to Z Sports Dallas Cowboys, as Dallas Cowboys land a W before even playing in Week 8, but it came at a cost no one wanted to pay.

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