Unwrapping Dallas's 2021 Christmas Haul By redsoxu571 on May 6, 2021, 3:31pm CDT + Well, that was interesting! A year removed from a draft class that was probably tops in the league in terms of reeling in consensus value, this time around the Cowboys...zagged. There may not be a Cowboy fan out there who needs to be told that the 2021 picks involved multiple by-consensus reaches to various degrees, including one major objective reach that had to pull a muscle or leave behind some back pain. Does this mean it's a bad class? By one measure, and to be frank - yes, it was bad. By value, the Cowboys left some draft capital on the table, missing opportunities to pick guys closer to their expected range in order to import more overall talent or move down and bank something in the way of future picks. But keep in mind that the per-capital value of a class is only a portion, and a smaller portion at that, of how the class ultimately stacks out. How well it helps stockpile the team on paper counts too, and most importantly how the players pan out will be the final judge. For example, the Seattle Seahawks have developed a reputation in recent years of ignoring consensus rankings with their early picks and simply taking the guys they like - but it isn't that practice itself that has hurt the franchise as much as the fact that the guys taken haven't contributed enough. More on that later!