The Dallas Cowboys have fully attacked the 2025 trade deadline, and no move is bigger than the team acquiring three-time Pro Bowl defensive tackle Quinnen Williams. It took a first-round pick, a second-round pick, and Mazi Smith to get Williams from New York to Dallas, and the Cowboys will eventually have to give the star defender a new contract, but it’s a costly move the team needed to make.
Adding the 2022 All-Pro defensive tackle to Dallas' struggling defense is enough for Cowboys fans to be happy with. However, this move likely sets Dallas up for a big signing in free agency this offseason that would address another need. That possible signing is of Williams' older brother, Quincy Williams, a linebacker in the final season of his contract with the Jets, who doesn't seem happy about New York's fire sale.
pic.twitter.com/IMpk7GKrfv
— Quincy Williams (@quincywilliams_) November 4, 2025
Cowboys could sign linebacker Quincy Williams in free agency after Quinnen Williams trade
The Williams brothers had been teammates on the Jets since 2021, spending the last five years playing alongside each other. While the new Cowboys defensive tackle entered the NFL as the third-overall pick in 2019, the older Williams, the linebacker, was drafted by the Jacksonville Jaguars in the third round the same year. After two seasons in Jacksonville, he was waived and immediately claimed by New York.
During his time with the Jets, Quincy quickly went from just being Quinnen’s brother to an elite linebacker, standing on his own name. The older Williams was named First-Team All-Pro in 2023, and he became a tackling machine. In five years with the Jets, Quincy Williams has started 65 of the 69 games he’s played in, recording 493 tackles, 53 for a loss, 10.5 sacks, nine forced fumbles, 24 pass deflections, and one interception.
He has been limited to four games with a shoulder injury this season, but as a pending free agent, whose brother was just traded away, Quincy’s time in New York is seemingly coming to an end. The Cowboys now make perfect sense as his next team.
Keeping the brothers together is only part of the reason why this move makes sense. The reason Dallas acquired Quinnen Williams is that the defense is abysmal; that’s also why the Cowboys traded for Logan Wilson on Tuesday.
Dallas needs all the defensive help it can get, and a run-stopping linebacker is something the team has been searching for years. Trading for Quinnen Williams should finally help the Cowboys land one.