Cowboys-Eagles battle for NFC East on early-down success, pass-rush win rate

Dallas looks to clinch the division this Sunday, and the advanced stats indicate it should happen

The NFC East title could finally be decided this Sunday in Philadelphia.  The Dallas Cowboys head into this one as 3-point favorites as of Thursday morning, but my adjusted EPA ranks see them as favored by closer to a touchdown.  The big caveat with that prediction is that division games are, quite frankly, just tougher.

In their previous meeting, Dallas rolled the Eagles 37-10 on the back of three rushing touchdowns from three different players (Ezekiel Elliott, Dak Prescott, and Tavon Austin).  Dallas is currently coming out of a game in which Elliott ran for two more with fellow running back Tony Pollard adding one of his own as well.  There will be plenty of focus this week on the Cowboys rushing attack, and with good reason.  But the performance of Pro Bowl snub Dak Prescott is going to play just as important of a role.

Here’s a breakdown of their first meeting in terms of EPA and success rate, courtesy of Ben Baldwin‘s box scores found at airyards.com.

One of the more concerning things about this game was the lack of success on early downs.  Early-down offense is generally a better indicator of what an offense is, as third-down play calls are dictated more by the distance to go while all plays are available to a coordinator on early downs.  In this game, the Cowboys were saved by a great third down performance by Prescott.  Dak dropped back 10 times on third down, with an average distance to go of 9.8 yards, and converted seven of those attempts into first downs.

If the Cowboys want to look better this week, they’ll need to improve their early down performance, because that third down success is tough to repeat.  One of the best ways to find success against this Eagles defense in 2019 has been through the air, so Kellen Moore shouldn’t be afraid to air it out on early downs in this one.

Philadelphia ranks fourth against the run, but twentieth against the pass.  Their pass rush is fierce, but that secondary is something that every Eagles fan would agree is a glaring weakness.  Here’s a snippet of the backend of the Eagles defense getting completely flummoxed by the Miami Dolphins.

The real question is how well the Cowboys offensive line can hold up against Philadelphia’s front seven.  Philadelphia is in the middle of the pack in terms of total sacks this year, but they are sixth in expected sacks and third in ESPN’s pass rush win rate (PRWR).  A quick breakdown for those unfamiliar with these terms:

Expected Sacks is a QB-adjusted way of describing how many sacks we’d expect a player or team to have based on their pressure rate, since pressures are more stable for linemen and sacks are largely a quarterback stat.  PRWR is how often a lineman can beat his blocker within 2.5 seconds, because after that time frame the ball is usually coming out of the quarterback’s hand.

What this all means is that the Eagles create a ton of pressure on opposing quarterbacks regardless of what their sack totals may say, and this can be seen as yet another indictment of a secondary that can’t cover long enough to allow their linemen to finish the sack.

The Cowboys offense is good enough that this game shouldn’t be very close, but anyone who has spent time watching a Cowboys game this year knows that you can’t count on any win before the clock hits zero.

There are four teams with at least 10 wins and a worse point differential than Dallas.  It’s truly astounding, and in my opinion should be cause for confidence going forward.  The Cowboys have scored a lot more points than their opponents.  That’s a good thing, regardless of record.  This one is on the road in Philly, but there is definitely reason to be optimistic that this long battle for the NFC East will finally, mercifully, be over this Sunday.

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