FRISCO, Texas — The rubber is starting to quickly meet the road for the Dallas Cowboys rookie class. Only one week removed from the 2026 NFL Draft, if that, Caleb Downs and Malachi Lawrence lead the first-year players into the team's headquarters as first-round picks looking to help reset the standard.
But the draft didn't end on Day 1, and Devin Moore is hellbent on making sure everyone understands that though he was selected in the fourth round with the 114th-overall pick, he will punch far above his weight class once the pads come on later this summer and beyond.
"I had some injuries in college," Moore told DallasCowboys.com at the start of rookie minicamp on Thursday. "I feel like that had me very overlooked and slept on. The size, the speed, ability to bend and tackle, the length, I feel like I had been overlooked."
To that point, Moore told the Cowboys, following the selection, that they just picked "the best corner in the draft" on Day 2, and that's something he's looking forward to new defensive coordinator Christian Parker putting to the test — a coach that demands both versatility and excellence.
"The main thing is versatility," said Moore. "I can play man. I can play zone. I'm smart enough to know the whole secondary. I'm versatile and that was the main conversation [with Parker]. … The NFL is a very complicated game. You can't run man the whole game and you can't run zone the whole game.
"You have to have players out there that can mix it up with both coverages, that can give the QB and offenses different looks."
The 22-year-old native of Florida is also being reunited with his former Tallahassee teammate, linebacker Shemar James, who got the nod as the Cowboys' fifth-round pick one year ago. That brotherhood should serve Moore nicely, helping him to acclimate more quickly with James showing him the NFL ropes.
Moore is coming off of his best collegiate season, and his healthiest, finishing with 11 games played and contributing 35 tackles, two interceptions and one sack to Florida's efforts in 2025; and that's the version Dallas is banking on seeing going forward.
"Just walking through the halls, I was blessed enough to see Shemar James, former Gator," he said. "We came into [Florida] with the same recruiting class. Just seeing guys of that caliber and character around the building — it's a blessing to be here."
