It’s schedule release week. That not only means that the 2025 schedule gets fully released on Wednesday, but it also means that some of the premier games get leaked ahead of time. On Monday morning, the NFL announced that the season's first game will be between the Super Bowl LIX champion Philadelphia Eagles (who beat the Chiefs 40-6) and the Dallas Cowboys.
That means that Dallas’ rookies get to start their careers playing against the best team in the world. That specifically means that Jalen Carter gets to give Tyler Booker his very immediate welcome to the NFL moment.
Jalen Carter gets a rookie in Week 1
My first job out of college was at A Big Beer Company. I was a dumb 24-year-old doing logistics. I didn’t know what logistics was — to be fair, I still don’t. But I was supposed to send beer from different breweries to warehouses all around the country. My first day was the Thursday before the Daytona 500, and as luck would have it, there was a shortage of a very specific type of light beer that the Daytona 500 spends a whole lot of money on.
My phone rang, and it was the warehouse in Daytona. The guy on the phone dog-cussed me into oblivion, and I looked to the guy who was training me for some help. He gave me a ‘I don’t know. Figure it out,' kind of look. I didn’t figure it out, no one in Daytona got their beer, and they moved me to a data entry job.
My point is that I know exactly what Tyler Booker is going to be going through on September 4th. Except in his case, the angry dude in Daytona is going to be Jalen Carter, at six feet, three inches tall, weigh 315 pounds, and be one of the best defensive tackles in the world.
Tyler Booker is more than likely going to be taking over the starting right guard spot in Dallas, since future Hall-of-Famer Zack Martin retired back in February. Losing a player like that is a big loss for any team, most of the time.
Even though Jason Kelce retired going into the 2024 season, the Eagles' offensive line didn't take a step back — not even a little bit. That was an anomaly, and it was an anomaly because the rest of the Eagles’ offensive line (and the quarterback) are some of the best in the world at their jobs. The Cowboys don’t have that kind of infrastructure.
The days of that offensive line being stalwarts are long gone. It’s not Tyron Smith, Tyler Smith, Tyler Biadasz, Zack Martin and Terrance Steele anymore. Now it’s Tyler Guyton, Tyler Smith, Cooper Beebe, Tyler Booker and Terrance Steele. Yeah, it’s still a lot of Tylers, but these Tylers aren’t as good as those Tylers.
Now, Booker isn’t a slouch. He’s everything that you would want in a guard, and there’s a very good reason that the Cowboys drafted him with the 12th overall pick. He’s unfortunately big, strong, powerful and smart.
He’s not Zack Martin though, and he probably (read: hopefully) never will be Zack Martin. This is going to be the Cowboys' first season without Martin since he was drafted in 2014. Any time a team loses a future Hall-of-Famer, there are going to be some big question marks.
When Cam Jurgens came into play center after Kelce retired, he had a year of starting at right guard under his belt. Booker is coming in green, untested and ready to get whomped.
For the very first snap of Booker’s NFL career, he has to line up against Carter. Then the snap after that, and the snap after that, and so on. Maybe this matchup will bud into a decent rivalry down the line, but when it comes to that Week 1 game, Jalen Carter is set up to give Booker a very violent, and visually delightful, How do ya do?
In 10 years, someone will interview Tyler Booker and say, What was your welcome to the league moment? and he’ll answer, ‘Jalen Carter emasculated me in front of my friends, family and the entire world on September 4th, 2025. That was the first play of the game, and it’s what kicked off Jalen’s current run of 10 straight Defensive Player of the Year awards.’