Washington Commanders v Dallas Cowboys | Cooper Neill/GettyImages
George Pickens has been everything the Dallas Cowboys had hoped for and more since acquiring him via trade. Not only is he the perfect No. 2 wide receiver to pair with CeeDee Lamb, but as we saw for a few weeks, he can operate as the No. 1 receiver at any given time.
Pickens had another fantastic performance in Week 7, catching four passes for 80 yards in a blow-out win over the Washington Commanders. But there is another part of his game that is going unnoticed and it’s a big reason why the Cowboys have been so successful on offense this season.
The hidden value of Cowboys star WR George Pickens
Going into Monday Night Football, Pickens is currently fourth in the NFL in receiving yards with 607. He is behind only Jaxon Smith-Njigba, Ja’Marr Chase, and Puka Nacua. But he has a skill that those other three don’t have and it’s his ability to draw defensive pass interference calls.
So far this season, Pickens has drawn four defensive pass interference calls in seven games. Those four plays have resulted in 116 yards of offense for the Cowboys. And not coincidently, the Cowboys have scored touchdowns all four drives that Pickens has created a defensive pass interference penalty.
Through seven weeks, Marvin Harrison Jr. (100) is the only other receiver in the NFL to draw more than 68 penalty yards on defensive pass interference calls. And since 2023, only Alec Pierce (238 DPI yards) has drawn more yards on defensive pass interference calls than Pickens (234 DPI yards), according to TruMedia.
There is an art to draw calls and Pickens has mastered it. One of the many reasons why he has drawn so many penalties is his ability to win down the field. Defensive backs have no choice but to interfere with him in order to avoid giving up a bigger play. Pickens has also mastered the ability of “late hands” which means defensive backs can’t get a read on when the ball is expected to arrive, and it ends up inviting contact without the defender’s head turning around.
While you can’t build an offense around defensive pass interference calls, they can swing drives and games. And that’s already happened several times this season for Pickens and the Cowboys. If you were to add every wide receivers yards plus their DPI yardage, let’s call it “true yardage”, Pickens would be leading the NFL in that category after seven weeks.
Pickens saw just six targets (seven if you include the DPI call) in Week 7, but he made his impact known. And that’s exactly what the Cowboys were hoping to get when they traded a 2026 third-round pick for him this offseason. He doesn’t need double-digit targets to be a force, but he can handle that workload, if needed.
We will see what the second half of the 2025 season has in store for Pickens, but this has been one of the best wide receiver trades in Dallas Cowboys history, so far.
