The Dallas Cowboys have produced a lot of Hall of Fame players over the years, which has helped the franchise win five Super Bowl titles. They have had superstars across every position, but the best wide receivers in Cowboys history include some of the greatest the NFL has ever seen.
Bill Parcells once complained that the quarterback of the Cowboys automatically became one of the biggest celebrities in all of sports. While that’s true, Don Meredith, Roger Staubach, Troy Aikman, Tony Romo, and Dak Prescott wouldn’t have become the stars they became without their star wideouts.
On this list, we have WRs that span from as far back as 1973 to as recently as 2017. And the next time we do this list, there is a good chance it will go to the present day, as CeeDee Lamb is quickly moving up the rankings. For now, though, these are the five best Cowboys wide receivers of all time.
1. Michael Irvin
Michael Irvin was just as important to the Cowboys’ ’90s dynasty as Troy Aikman or Emmitt Smith
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“The Playmaker” pretty easily takes the top spot on the list of best Cowboys wide receivers of all time. While America’s Team has arguably the richest history of any franchise, the early 1990s “How ‘bout them Cowboys?!” teams are the best of the impressive bunch. And those teams were led by the “Triplets,” Troy Aikman, Emmitt Smith, and Michael Irvin.
Irvin was the first of the “Triplets” to show up in Big D, getting to Texas via the University of Miami in 1988. He was the No. 11 pick of that draft, which came a year before Aikman got to town and two before Smith.
In those first three seasons, as the Cowboys slowly morphed into what they would become, Irvin couldn’t quite capture the Hurricane magic that made him a top pick. However, in 1991, with everyone finally in place — including his college coach, Jimmy Johnson — “The Playmaker” started making plays.
That season, Irvin led the league with 1,523 yards on 93 catches with eight touchdowns. It would kick off a stretch of seven seasons in the next eight years with over 1,000 yards for Irvin. During that time, he made five Pro Bowls, a First-Team All-Pro squad, and won three Super Bowls.
While tight end Jason Witten is the Cowboys’ franchise-leading pass catcher, Irvin leads all Cowboys wide receivers with 750 catches and 11,904 yards.
2. Drew Pearson
From undrafted to the Hall of Fame, Drew Pearson willed himself to become one of the best of all time
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One of the greatest undrafted players in NFL history, Drew Pearson went from not hearing his phone ring in Tulsa on draft night in 1973 to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Pearson joined a Cowboys team just two seasons removed from a Super Bowl win and led by new starting quarterback Roger Staubach. With “Bullet” Bob Hayes in the final years of his career, the team was looking for a new WR1.
The New Jersey native provided that in his second season, going for 1,087 yards on 62 catches. He would go from there to lead his team in receiving yards for four straight seasons, including during the team’s 1977 Super Bowl-winning campaign.
In that 1977 season, Pearson led the NFL with 870 receiving yards and made one of his three Pro Bowls and three First-Team All-Pro squads. That was also the season the next player on this list showed up to give the Cowboys one of the best WR tandems in history.
Alongside Tony Hill, Staubauch had an incredible pass-catching duo at his disposal, and while Hill would actually lead the team in receiving yards most years after, it was Pearson who earned the nickname “Mr. Clutch” for his big-plays-in-big-games ability.
3. Tony Hill
There was nothing better for Cowboys fans in the ’70s and ’80s than seeing “The Thrill” going deep
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It’s hard to talk about Drew Pearson without also discussing Tony Hill. The Stanford product was a third-round pick in the 1977 NFL Draft and slowly acclimated to the league with just over 200 receiving yards as a rookie.
However, Tom Landry and others saw the speed, the talent, and the big-play ability in the man they would call “The Thrill,” and that won him a starting job in his sophomore season. He would post 823 yards in 1978 and go on to lead the Cowboys in receiving yardage for the next seven seasons while making three Pro Bowls.
Ultimately, Hill is third in Cowboys history in career receiving yards (7,988), sixth in receptions (489), and fifth in receiving touchdowns (510).
4. Dez Bryant
As good as Dez Bryant was, he’ll always be remembered for the one catch referees said he didn’t make
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Dez Bryant is a more recent addition to the Cowboys receiver pantheon, as the pass-catcher played with Tony Romo and the ‘Boys from 2010 to 2017. He was a first-round pick (No. 24) out of Oklahoma State and wound up playing eight seasons in Big D.
Bryant was from a generation that grew up watching some of the archetype difficult-personality wide receivers like Randy Moss and Terrell Owens, so it makes a lot of sense that he was often a lot to handle both on and off the field for Dallas.
However, when Bryant was good, he was very good.
During his Cowboys tenure, Bryant had 531 catches for 7,459 yards and 73 touchdowns, including 16 in 2012 when he led the league with 16 TDs. He also made three Pro Bowls and got one First-Team All-Pro nod during this time.
As good as he was, Bryant’s most famous play in the league was a “drop” in the playoffs against the
Green Bay Packers following the 2014 season.
Down five with just over four minutes left, Bryant seemingly made an amazing leaping catch that put the Cowboys inside the 1-yard line. When he reached out for the goal line, though, the ball hit the ground, and due to the catch/no-catch rules at the time, the refs ruled it incomplete and Dallas lost the game. To this day, it is still one of the most controversial rulings in league history.
5. Terrell Owens
“T.O.” only spent three seasons in Dallas, but boy were they memorable ones
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With apologies to several Cowboys WRs who played with the team for longer, like “Bullet” Bob Hayes and Amari Cooper , Terrell Owens has to make this list of the best Cowboys wide receivers of all time.
“T.O.” was only in Dallas for three seasons, but boy were they memorable. From putting up 3,587 yards and 38 touchdowns in just 47 games to crying, “That’s my quarterback!” in the locker room, there was never a dull moment when Owens was around.
Owens was one of the most physically gifted and naturally talented WRs to ever play the game and is probably at the top of both those lists for the Cowboys franchise. And despite all the drama, the other key stat for Owens, outside the 1,000-plus yards and double-digit TDs every year, is that the Cowboys were 33-15 with “T.O.,” and he’s a big part of the reason why.