The Cowboys’ final injury report of the week isn’t due until tomorrow.
But with the team heading to Brazil on Thursday night, there are a few key players who have been ruled out because they won’t be making the trip.
Linebacker DeMarvion Overshown (hamstring), safety Malik Hooker (forearm), cornerback Cobie Durant (hamstring), and safety P.J. Locke (foot) have all been ruled out for Sunday’s contest against the Ravens.
All four players were out of practice on Wednesday and Thursday.
Durant started the first two games and played 87 snaps; Hooker started the season opener and played only 12 snaps before his injury; Locke started the Week 2 game and has played 31 defensive snaps and 11 on special teams; and Overshown started the season opener and played 51 defensive snaps and three on special teams before his injury.
Outside linebacker James Houston appears on track to play Sunday, as he was a full participant for the second day in a row.
Ravens Clips
Ravens defensive tackle Nnamdi Madubuike’s return from a neck injury progressed to full practice participation this week, but his status for Sunday’s game remains unclear.
Madubuike said on Thursday that he feels like he’s “in the ballpark” when asked if he’d play against the Cowboys in Rio this weekend, but a final decision about whether he’ll be active is still to come.
“I’m working out every day to continue to keep getting better,” Madubuike said, via Ryan Mink of the team’s website. “So, you know, we’ll see. But I’m in a good place and coaches feel so too, so just taking just one day at a time. But I feel great.”
Madubuike last played in Week 2 of the 2025 season, so a return would be both a long time in the making and welcome for a defense that broke down late in last Sunday’s loss to the Saints.
The Ravens have a long flight to Rio coming soon.
Will Zay Flowers be on the plane?
It isn’t necessarily trending that direction, as multiple reporters on the scene note that Flowers is not practicing again on Thursday.
Flowers is dealing with a hamstring injury he aggravated during the Week 1 victory over the Colts. He was a limited participant in Friday’s practice last week, but did not practice on Wednesday.
Flowers had five catches for 150 yards with a touchdown before exiting the season opener.
Offensive tackle Ronnie Stanley (toe) also was not practicing on Thursday.
But edge rusher Trey Hendrickson was back on the field after missing Wednesday’s session.
Baltimore’s second injury report of the week will be out later on Thursday. If any player does not travel, that will also be released later in the day, as the Ravens are flying to Brazil overnight.
The Cowboys are flying to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, tonight, arriving Friday morning for their Sunday game against the Ravens. Dallas head coach Brian Schottenheimer is confident his team will arrive well-rested.
Schottenheimer said the Cowboys planned their trip around letting the team sleep on the 10-hour flight to be ready for a normal Friday practice.
“Most of the guys have lay-down seats. It’s a big, big plane. It’s important. We’ve talked a lot about it. We’re gonna get on the plane, take off 7:30, 8 o’clock, which is already 10 o’clock Rio time. We’re going to fly through the night. We’ve thought of everything. our team: The compression pants and shirts you wear. It’s going to be a dark plane. We’ll feed them a little bit, but we need them to rest. And then when we get there we’re going to get them moving pretty quick and get out to a meting, and then a practice, and try to get them acclimated as best we can.”
There’s been a lot of talk that the playing surface at Rio’s Maracanã Stadium isn’t suitable to the demands of an NFL game, but Schottenheimer said the team is no more concerned about that than in any outdoor game.
“That’s every week,” Schottenheimer said. “That’s one of the benefits of playing in the dome, you don’t have much to worry about — maybe the majestic lights that show up from time to time. But when you’re playing outdoors, you’ve always got to be ready to adjust. You’ve got to be ready for, is it raining, is the surface, is it windy? All of those things are on our gameday checklist.”
International travel has been closely scrutinized this season, especially after the Rams defied the typical travel plans by arriving in Australia only a day before kickoff — and then played poorly in their loss to the 49ers. The Ravens and Cowboys are both flying to Brazil tonight, and from all indications neither team thinks travel will make a big difference to the result of the game.
There was a lot of focus on travel plans leading into the Week 1 game between the 49ers and Rams in Australia, but there’s been less attention paid to the Ravens and Cowboys as they prepare to play in Rio this week.
There’s good reason for that as it is a much less severe time difference for both teams, but there’s still an overnight flight for both teams on Thursday night and that will be different than other games that take place in different time zones. On Wednesday, Ravens safety Kyle Hamilton said that he thinks the team has a good handle on how to approach Sunday’s game.
“I think the staff — credit to everybody involved — has a great plan in place for us when we get down there, and [we are] going to try to take advantage of the travel in a way that it is not hindering us coming into Sunday,” Hamilton said, via the team’s website. “I think the words ‘flying out of our skin’ were used in the team meeting, so that is the ultimate goal. Obviously, both sides are dealing with it, so there are really no excuses to be made but, I think we have a good plan in place and good organization when we get down there.”
The interest in the travel plans for the Australia game was piqued by the different approaches that the two teams took to the trip. With the Cowboys and Ravens following the same schedule, it’s unlikely to be much of a talking point after the game either.
In a contract season, Cowboys wide receiver George Pickens is looking for an encore to his 93 receptions for 1,429 yards and nine touchdowns last season.
He has only nine catches for 68 yards through two games, with two drops. CeeDee Lamb leads the team with 13 receptions for 197 yards and three touchdowns.
“Long as we score, and as long as we’re winning, me personally, if I’m blocking or if I’m setting a crack block and that engineered the 37 points, I’m happy,” Pickens said Wednesday, via Tommy Yarrish of the team website.
Pickens’ numbers aren’t far off the start to his 2025 season when he made eight catches for 98 yards and a touchdown in the first two games.
“Of course I want to get him and CeeDee the ball,” Cowboys coach Brian Schottenheimer said. “I think CeeDee is playing great. I think George is playing really well. Some of the catches he made [against Washington] were really big-time plays in big-time situations for us. . . . He draws a lot of attention out there. But believe me, we’re looking for ways to continue to get those guys the ball.
“If you look at George last year, he didn’t take off until a couple games in. And the rest, as they know, is history how well he played. I have no questions about him and his readiness. He’ll be ready to go this week.”
Pickens agrees that he is playing well despite how the numbers look.
“I’d definitely say team for me. I feel like I’ve been doing great,” Pickens said. “As far as the team, like my whole game. Some people just look at certain parts of my game. My whole game I feel like has been great.”
The Cowboys rank 29th defensively, and to add injury to insult, they have three starters and a key reserve out of practice.
Cornerback Cobie Durant (hamstring), safety Malik Hooker (forearm), safety P.J. Locke (foot) and linebacker DeMarvion Overshown (hamstring) did not practice on Wednesday. That does not bode well for their availability for Sunday’s game against the Ravens in Brazil.
Durant started the first two games and played 87 snaps; Hooker started the season opener and played only 12 snaps before his injury; Locke started the Week 2 game and has played 31 defensive snaps and 11 on special teams; and Overshown started the season opener and played 51 defensive snaps and three on special teams before his injury.
Outside linebacker James Houston (shoulder) was a full participant Wednesday.
Ravens defensive tackle Nnamdi Madubuike injured his neck in Week 2 last season and has not seen the field since. He could return this week.
Madubuike was a full participant at Wednesday’s practice, marking the first time he has participated in team drills in more than a year.
In the first two weeks, he was limited in practice and inactive on game day.
Linebacker Teddye Buchanan (knee) also had his first full practice of the season.
The Ravens were without three starters at Wednesday’s practice, with wide receiver Zay Flowers (hamstring), outside linebacker Trey Hendrickson (finger) and offensive tackle Ronnie Stanley (toe) sitting out.
Wide receiver Chris Moore (ankle), offensive guard John Simpson (groin), safety Malaki Starks (hamstring) and outside linebacker Zion Young (quad) were limited.
The Cowboys defense has had a hard time keeping quarterbacks from making plays with their legs through the first two weeks of the season and they’ll face another player capable of hurting them in that area this week.
Lamar Jackson will be on the other side of the line when the Cowboys take on the Ravens in Brazil this Sunday and the Ravens are surely aware that the Cowboys have allowed an average of 6.6 yards every time a quarterback has run with the ball this season. Finding a way to keep Jackson from having the same kind of success is central to the Cowboys’ preparation this week and defensive tackle Kenny Clark identified the key facets to the team’s approach.
“Just being disciplined,” Clark said, via the team’s website. “Communication, just understanding our rush lanes, playing with extension, powering offensive linemen and just restricting those gaps so you can’t get through. But the main thing is just staying disciplined and communicating.”
The Cowboys’ job will be made more difficult by the presence of Derrick Henry in the Ravens’ backfield, so defensive coordinator Christian Parker will have his work cut out for him when it comes to improving on the team’s underwhelming defensive performance so far this season.
When Colin Kaepernick was being ignored by the NFL teams, he didn’t have much to say. Now that he’s selling a book, interviews with Kaepernick are popping up everywhere.
We haven’t paid much attention to his various sit-downs and sound bites because, frankly, it’s an old story. The NFL has long since moved on from Kaepernick, freezing him out long enough to make it unrealistic that the now-38-year-old quarterback would have a plausible path to a roster, a practice squad, or even a tryout.
Still, one news item caught our eye in recent weeks. With Kaepernick’s book tour putting him back in the vicinity of the front burner, Giants coach John Harbaugh told Ian O’Connor of The Athletic that Harbaugh wanted to add Kaepernick to the Ravens in 2017.
Through it all, Kaepernick got one workout, five years ago with the Raiders. With the Giants now desperate for quarterback help (and with Jake Haener and Brandon Allen as the most viable options behind new starter Jameis Winston), why not bring Kaepernick in for a look?
Kaepernick continues to say that he’s staying in shape, and that he wants to play. It should be immediately obvious whether he still has the abilities that made Harbaugh interested in him nine years ago.
Harbaugh’s New York staff includes Greg Roman, who was the offensive coordinator during Kaepernick’s first four years in San Francisco. It would be easy, in theory, to configure the offense to fit Kaepernick. If Kaepernick still has the skills he had when he last played.
It starts with a workout (and quite possibly ends with one). There’s no reason not to give it a whirl. The anthem controversy has subsided. (Harbaugh and the Giants surely would want assurances that Kaepernick wouldn’t dust it off, if he ended up on the sideline before games.)
The threshold question is how does Kaepernick look? And there’s only one way to find out. The Giants, who now face not having Jaxson Dart for up to the rest of the season, have plenty of reasons to give Kaepernick a chance to show them what he can do.
It would be different if John Harbaugh hadn’t recently spoken in such glowing terms about Kaepernick. With not many viable options available in free agency — and with Harbaugh having considerable power in New York — let’s see if Harbaugh puts his recent words into current action.
