Tag: cowboys defense

Has the Dan Quinn defense been exposed or are the Cowboys just exhausted?

The Cowboys defense played poorly against Seattle in Week 13, are the issues explainable or is this a sign of more bad things to come? | From @ReidDHanson

In what was possibly the most entertaining Thursday Night Football matchup of the season, the Cowboys successful dispatched their second winning team, beating Seattle 41-35 and moving to 9-3 on the season. It kept Dallas fresh on the heels of the NFC East leading Eagles and pushed Dak Prescott front and center into the MVP conversation.

While the high-scoring and puntless affair was a rousing success for TNF and truly fun to watch by most entertainment standards, entertaining football isn’t always good football. From the perspective of the Dallas defense, the Week 13 shootout with the Seahawks was anything but.

Passing for 334 yards with an EPA/play of +0.50, Geno Smith not only played his best game of the season, but arguably of his career. He carved up the Cowboys defense with relative ease and did so without the benefit of a running game.

Opponents with a winning record are now averaging over 35 points against Dallas in 2023. For perspective, Washington, the NFL’s worst defense in 2023, is averaging 29.2 points against them this season. The Cowboys are essentially playing like one of the worst defenses in the league when they match up against a winning team.

Can the Vikings’ offense be as good as it needs to be for a deep playoff run?

The Vikings’ 40-3 loss to the Cowboys raised serious questions about their offense. Laurie Fitzpatrick went looking for answers.

The Minnesota Vikings’ seven-game win streak came to an abrupt halt after an embarrassing 40-3 loss to the Dallas Cowboys last Sunday. This was their first loss since Week 2, when they lost 24-7 to the Philadelphia Eagles. Many were saying that this loss was foreseen, as the last seven of eight wins were all within eight points or less. Cousins has been able to pull it out in the end of games as he’s tied for first in the league with comeback wins with five.

Last week’s game was very much a blowout. Outside of the second drive of the game, which only ended in a field goal, the Vikings offense never even crossed the 50-yard line. Kirk Cousins was running for his life as he faced a 63% pressure rate from the Cowboys, and he took a season-high seven sacks.

We know that the Vikings are a good team, their record reflects that. But they are the first team in 30 years with at least eight wins through the first 10 games of a season to have a negative point differential. That minus-2 differential was obviously affected to a great deal by the Cowboys debacle, but it’s still more than noteworthy. When you have an 8-2 team with this many questions, it’s time to dig deep and find out.

Have the Cowboys revealed the recipe that could keep the Vikings from a deep playoff run?

Let’s go to the film and find out!

Yet again, Packers struggling offense faces another top defense in Cowboys

One week after scoring 9 points against one of the NFL’s worst defenses, the Packers will get a big test from Micah Parsons and the Cowboys defense.

Stop me if you’ve heard this before, but the Green Bay Packers are going up against one of the NFL’s top defenses once again, this time the Dallas Cowboys, who rank third in points per game allowed. In fact, between games played and ones upcoming, the Packers will face nine of the current top-12 defensive units by points per game this season.

This isn’t a particularly good thing for a stumbling Packers offense that scored just nine points against a Detroit defense that is statistically the worst in the NFL and on a historically bad pace.

As has been the case for much of the season, the Packers will enter Sunday’s contest with question marks along the offensive line, not knowing whether or not David Bakhtiari will be available after he missed most of the second half in Detroit. All things considered, the unit we saw on Sunday held up well in pass protection – although they struggled to create running lanes against a Lions’ front that was daring Green Bay to throw – but with that said, it wasn’t exactly a very productive pass rush unit they were up against either.

The Cowboys, meanwhile, enter this week ranked first in pressure rate and first in sacks, led by Micah Parsons. In addition to simply trying to slow Parsons, the added challenge that he brings is that from snap to snap, he could be lined up just about anywhere.

“The way he (Dan Quinn) moves Micah all over the field, and you don’t know where he’s going to be,” said Matt LaFleur on Wednesday. “They can just line up in a variety of different ways, and it presents a lot of challenges in terms of what you’re asking your players to do. He’s a game wrecker, especially if you let him. And the thing is, he’s not the only one. They platoon their defensive line, and those guys do such a great job of playing with unbelievable energy and effort, and you can truly see their play style on tape.”

However, as fierce as this Dallas pass rush is, the Cowboys have been susceptible on the ground, allowing 4.7 yards per carry and ranking 29th in ESPN’s run-stop win rate metric. Given Dallas’ ability to get after the quarterback, having Aaron Jones not only available but leaning on him heavily should be a key element to the Packers offense-although that’s the case every week, whether or not it actually happens.

We may see Dallas take a similar approach as Detroit did, where they put an emphasis on slowing the run game, thus daring Aaron Rodgers to throw the ball against the Cowboys’ aggressive secondary. Cornerback Trevon Diggs is third in pass breakups this season and tied for second in interceptions. As a team, the Cowboys rank third in turnover differential with seven interceptions and six forced fumbles.

“They do a great job of taking the ball away,” said LaFleur. “They got guys with tremendous ball skills on the back end. Obviously, everybody knows about Diggs and his ability to go get the football, but it’s not just him; I think they all truly feed off one another. You can see the defensive backs play a certain style because they know they’re going to get home with the pass rush. So it’s going to be a great challenge. We’ve played some other great defenses this year, and I’d put these guys up with anybody.”

Without a somewhat effective rushing attack, whether that be due to Dallas taking it away or the Packers getting pass happy, becoming one-dimensional against this Dallas front, which is then able to pin its ears back, is a recipe for disaster. Oftentimes during the LaFleur tenure, we’ve seen how quickly things go bad in these situations.

Rodgers and LaFleur may also opt to utilize the quick passing game often, a tactic they’ve relied on frequently this season with a banged-up offensive line. Through nine games, Rodgers’ average time to throw this season is the lowest of his career, according to PFF.

This certainly isn’t a bad strategy when it comes to keeping Rodgers clean – although he hasn’t been great from clean pockets – but it hasn’t been a sustainable strategy when it comes to putting up points either. Regularly trying to string together 13-plus play drives with short completions and rush attempts isn’t an effective way to score a lot of points, especially if Dallas is going to shrink the field by playing closer to the line of scrimmage.

Although the downfield attempts can’t be forced like they often were in Detroit, that element needs to be a part of this Packers’ offense if they are going to move the ball with any regularity. The Buffalo game is a prime example of how successful small ball – to steal a baseball term – isn’t necessarily going to lead to points. These downfield passes, in turn, will also help create opportunities for the run and quick passing games as well if Green Bay can hit on a few.

Early down success, regardless of what avenue that comes from (quick passes, downfield throws, or the run game), will be a must for Green Bay. It will keep them out of third downs, as well as help open up LaFleur’s playbook and put Green Bay in manageable third-down situations. If not, they’ll be forced to convert against a defense that ranks ninth in third-down percentage this season.

At 3-6, things look quite bleak for the Packers. In addition to their own struggles that they are dealing with on offense, following their game with Dallas, they face the 5-3 Titans and 8-0 Eagles, both of whom have top-10 defenses as well.

“It’s 100 miles per hour,” said LaFleur in regards to how this Dallas defense plays. “It’s guys truly playing every play as if it were their last. You see it all over, all the guys hustle and they’ve got great players too, so that makes it much more challenging, when you can get that out of those guys, it presents a lot of challenges.”

Film study: Three areas Cowboys must improve to become elite

Touchdown Wire’s Laurie Fitzpatrick breaks down the film to analyze weak spots in the Cowboys defense.

The Dallas Cowboys have their eyes on a deep playoff run.

So far this season, the Cowboys have stood toe to toe with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, beat the Los Angeles Chargers, handled the New England Patriots in overtime and completely dismantled the Atlanta Falcons. The Dallas offense has shown Super Bowl potential at times this season, even beating the Minnesota Vikings without starting quarterback Dak Prescott. But the Cowboys defense has shown lapses that potentially could haunt the team in the playoffs.

Let’s analyze three areas Dallas needs to clean up on defense if it expects to make legitimate noise in the postseason.

Film study: How Cowboys’ Trevon Diggs already has five picks

Touchdown Wire’s Laurie Fitzpatrick breaks down how Cowboys cornerback Trevon Diggs is getting so many interceptions.

Coming from University of Alabama, Trevon Diggs is accustomed to playing in the spotlight.

So maybe we shouldn’t be surprised that he hasn’t been overwhelmed on the big stage with the Dallas Cowboys. Four games into his second pro season, Diggs leads the NFL with five interceptions. In addition to his three picks in 12 games last year, he now has eight in his first 16 professional games.

Few predicted that Diggs would be playing this well, considering the Cowboys ranked 28th in the NFL in points allowed last season. So far this year, Dallas ranks 16th in the league in points allowed.

Meantime, defensive coordinator Dan Quinn has been putting Diggs into positions where he can succeed this season. Every level of the Cowboys defense boasts extremely good athleticism. Rookie linebacker Micah Parsons can rush the passer or drop back in coverage effectively. Veteran linebacker Jaylon Smith possesses impressive speed at the second level, and safety Damontae Kazee is great in coverage.

With all that in mind, let’s go to the tape and examine how the Cowboys are using Diggs.

Every week, Diggs lines up against the X receiver, who is usually the top playmaker out of a team’s receiving corps. So in Week 1 against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Diggs was lined up across from Mike Evans.

On this play, it’s all heads up by Diggs. He watches the offensive line running upfield and sniffs out the screen.

Diggs relied on his eyes, liked what he saw and attacked. However, this strategy almost got him in trouble later in the game against Evans.

On the play above, Evans runs a comeback route. But it’s Tom Brady’s last read, so since Evans already made his break toward the ball, he decides to cut back upfield to get open. Diggs already had tried to jump the route and appeared to be beaten on the play. Fortunately for Diggs, his length saved him. Diggs is 6-foot-1 with 78–inch (which ranks in the 90th percentile for defensive backs), and he was able to stretch, recover and get the pass breakup.

In Week 2 against the Los Angeles Chargers, Diggs covered Keenan Allen when the Cowboys lined up in man coverage. As you’ll see below, Diggs has a knack for jumping routes.

To this point, Cowboys opponents haven’t seemed to adjust to Diggs’ performances from week to week. Instead, the Eagles and DeVonta Smith were the next victims of Diggs in man coverage.

At the top of your screen, Diggs is one-on-one against Smith, his former college teammate. Presumably, they know each other pretty well from practice at Alabama, and Diggs won this battle with size and competitiveness.

If the Eagles had focused on how Diggs covered Evans in Week 1, they would have noticed how Diggs loves to jump routes. Any wheel route or double move would have a chance to beat him deep. However, the Cowboys are doing everything possible to force these battles.

By Week 4, the Cowboys and their defensive line have shown a lot of progress in terms of applying pressure to the quarterback. With the drive on the line, Diggs is lined up across from Carolina Panthers wideout DJ Moore on the outside.

On third down, the Cowboys leave Diggs off coverage at the bottom of the screen, which gives him time to read the play. Diggs gets another interception off a curl route.

The next time the Panthers got the ball, they used a stacked lineup on the outside, which sometimes forces the defense to switch. Instead, the Cowboys just place Diggs in the middle of the field to sit in zone coverage.

Unfortunately for the Panthers, the coverage allowed Diggs to sit back and wait for his opportunity.

Because the Cowboys generate pressure up front and possess speed in the back, it’s hard to get their defense off balance. In man coverage, they can keep up downfield. In zone coverage, they bring different looks to force quarterbacks into bad throws underneath.

It’s up to the offense to create mismatches against Dallas and take chances deep.

Chargers WR Mike Williams throws shade at Cowboys pass defense

Chargers wide receiver Mike Williams is eager to build off his dominant performance.

In his new role in Joe Lombardi’s system, Chargers wide receiver Mike Williams flashed dominance in last Sunday’s victory over Washington.

Williams had 12 targets, and hauled in eight passes for 82 yards and a score.

Looking to carry that momentum into Week 2, Williams will face a Cowboys team that surrendered 379 passing yards in the season opener against the Buccaneers.

Williams took note of quarterback Tom Brady’s big night, and believes that he and the rest of the receiving corps could be in line for a field day this upcoming weekend.

“Tampa Bay receivers looked like they was having some fun out there,” Williams said when asked about Dallas’ defense.

While the Cowboys were gashed through the air, they still managed to pick off Brady twice, one of which came from the team’s No. 1 corner, Trevon Diggs.

Diggs shadowed three-time Pro Bowl wide receiver Mike Evans and fared very well. Aligning across from Evans on 39 of 47 routes, Diggs only allowed just one reception for 10 yards on three targets.

Diggs will likely match-up with Keenan Allen for the majority of the game, which means that Williams could see success, especially if he draws Anthony Brown, who gave up seven completions for 121 yards, one touchdown and a 158.3 passer rating last week.

Nonetheless, quarterback Justin Herbert, who completed nearly two-thirds of his passes for well over 300 yards to nine different targets, will be eager to feast on their highly suspect secondary.

Just when you think the Cowboys’ defense couldn’t get any worse, it did!

The Cowboys’ defense has been horrible all year. Somehow, it’s gotten even worse against the Washington Football Team.

The Cowboys’ defense has been really, really bad all season long. We already knew this, of course, and while there are multiple explanations for the problem, you can pretty much narrow it down to coaching when you see good players playing this often out of position and with fatal hesitation. Thus, this failure falls on the head of defensive coordinator Mike Nolan, who wanted to install a more “multiple” defense with a limited offseason program and no preseason games due to COVID concerns.

Why is the Cowboys’ defense so bad? It’s complicated.

The result? Nobody goes nowhere, as they say. The 2-4 Cowboys have a Week 7 matchup against a Washington Football Team that has been just as bad on offense as Dallas has been on defense.

Or so we thought. In the battle between the moveable force and the resistible object, it’s the Football Team that has won the battle.

And here is rookie running back Antonio Gibson parting the waters on this 12-yard touchdown run…

And then, it was receiver Terry McLaurin beating the pants off rookie cornerback Trevon Diggs for Washington’s second touchdown of the day. Diggs had been playing relatively well in his inaugural NFL campaign, which led me to believe that he hadn’t quite accepted his role in Nolan’s defense. Apparently, that has changed.

The Cowboys have also been a disaster on offense, but the defense is the problem, it has been all season, and if this continues, this team won’t even be able to win the NFC East — a proposition that probably won’t take more than 6-7 wins.

Watch: The Dallas Cowboys stuff Washington on the goalline

The highly-criticized Dallas defense came up with a huge fourth-down stop on the goalline.

Fourth-down stops are harder and harder to come by in today’s NFL. Perhaps the toughest might be stopping an offense on fourth-and-goal inside the one-yard line.

But for the beleaguered Dallas Cowboys’ defense, they did just that early in their rivalry game against the Washington Football Team:

Dallas stuffs this quarterback sneak attempt from Washington’s Kyle Allen. It begins right at the point of attack. Watch what veteran nose tackle Dontari Poe does to the center. Off the snap Poe drives Washington’s Chase Roullier into the backfield, which forces the quarterback to take a wider berth. Instead of knifing into the A-Gap between the center and the right guard, Allen has to widen his path behind the right guard into the B-Gap. That delay allows the rest of the Cowboys’ front, including the second-level defenders, to arrive for the stop.

Sometimes an early defensive stand can fuel a team to victory. This might be the case for Dallas on this afternoon.

 

Why is the Cowboys’ defense so bad? It’s complicated.

The Cowboys’ defense has gone from pretty good to epically bad in 2020. New defensive coordinator Mike Nolan is on the clock to fix it.

Last season, under defensive coordinator Rod Marinelli and defensive backs coach Kris Richard, the Cowboys fielded a defense that, per Sports Info Solutions, played more Cover-3 than any team but the Chargers (217 pass dropbacks), allowing 136 receptions for 1,655 yards, eight touchdowns, and just four interceptions. Overall, a defense that was based more on execution than scheme allowed 21 touchdowns to just seven interceptions, gave up an opposing QBR of 92.27, and ranked 16th in Defensive DVOA. None of these numbers were catastrophic — they put Dallas in the middle of the pack in an NFL sense — but owner and ultimate shot-caller Jerry Jones wanted better.

To that end, the Cowboys hired defensive coordinator Mike Nolan, who had not served in that role for any other team since 2014 when he did so for the Falcons (who ranked 31st in Defensive DVOA that season), and had spent the last three seasons as the Saints’ linebackers coach. The move made sense from a continuity standpoint as Nolan served as the 49ers’ head coach in 2005 when now-Dallas head coach Mike McCarthy was the team’s offensive coordinator, but what Nolan prescribed to fix what ailed his new team’s defense was a lot of schematic complexity — the kind of thing that can go very wrong if, for example, you’re dealing with a truncated offseason due to a major pandemic.

“If you give yourself too much of doing one thing, that’s easy for the best quarterbacks to dissect and take advantage of,” Nolan said in February. “You have to have a good mix between man and zone… You don’t want to create so much volume that you really don’t have an identity, but you have to have some kind of variety in order to be successful.”

Variety has not been the spice of the Cowboys’ life through their first four games. At the same time Dallas’ offense is roasting enemy defenses at a record clip, Nolan’s squad is getting equally bombed. Dallas ranks second in the NFL, tied with the Browns behind the Falcons, with 12 touchdown passes allowed, and just one interception for their trouble. That opposing QBR allowed has shot up to 115.37 (only the Falcons are worse), and the defense has plummeted to 24th in DVOA.

Aug 24, 2020; Frisco, TX, USA; Dallas Cowboys player Jaylon Smith (right) talks with Mike Nolan during training camp at Ford Center at The Star in Frisco, Texas. (James D. Smith via USA TODAY Sports)

McCarthy has said that he’s staying the course with Nolan, and perhaps things will get better as Nolan’s charges get the hang of the new playbook, but coming off a 49-38 embarrassment at the hands of the Browns in which Dallas allowed 307 rushing yards and 508 total yards, there are people who wish to be heard on the matter. Edge-rusher Demarcus Lawrence called his own squad “soft” after the Browns loss, which is about the most cringe-worthy word you can apply to any defense.

McCarthy has also doubled down on the idea of schematic complexity — an interesting construct for an offensive play-designer who would generally have to spice his own playbook up pretty severely to get to “vanilla” status.

“We’re in a scheme change from the prior scheme here, and we’re not off to a good start,” McCarthy said. “The worst thing we can do is narrow everything down and be a one-call defense. I refuse to do that. That’s not the path. We have a defense that fits our players.”

The “soft” comment paid negative dividends, leading to defensive remarks which opened a figurative can regrading the effort — or lack thereof — the Cowboys were putting out on that side of the ball.

“Our effort’s been good,” safety Xavier Woods said Wednesday. via ESPN’s Todd Archer. “I mean, on certain plays some guys, I mean, me included, there may be a lack, but overall the effort is there. I mean, you don’t expect, we’re in the NFL, you don’t expect guys full speed for 70 plays. That’s not possible. But you’re going to push all you can. I mean, we know. You don’t expect a backside corner to make a play on the opposite side. If he’s running full speed the whole time, it’s just not possible, to be honest.”

“I think it was a situation of trying to answer questions after a poor performance is the way I would classify it,” McCarthy said Thursday in an attempt to clarify what Woods said. “I don’t think it’s a statement that can be laid up against every possible situation in football as far as hypotheticals and things like that. We’ve addressed our performance Sunday. It was poor. The coaching on pursuit and expectations is on line with everybody’s expectations and understanding on how you play this game.”

“That [criticism] is outside-the-building noise. It doesn’t really affect us inside the building,” linebacker Joe Thomas said. “If there was an effort issue, it would’ve been addressed inside the building. I don’t think that was an issue at all. It’s just communication. When we’re all on the same page and we know what’s going on, we play faster and it looks a lot better.”

After my own review of Dallas’ defensive miscues, I think Thomas has hit the nail on the proverbial head. It’s not that the Cowboys are lacking effort — in fact, there are too many times when everyone is going all-out to the ball, heading to misdirection issues and instances in which whatever keys the defenders are supposed to read are simply thrown away in the frenetic paradigm. The problem is hesitation and missed assignments from defenders who are used to reacting, and are now asked to think before they move. That takes a split second, and in the NFL, a split second is a lifetime.

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Dak Prescott becomes third QB in NFL history to reach an unfortunate statistical mark

Dak Prescott did everything he could, but he couldn’t stop the Cowboys from losing to the Browns. Matthew Stafford and Tony Romo understand.

How bad is the Cowboys’ defense right now? Well, pretty bad. Dallas allowed 33 first downs, 508 total yards, and 307 rushing yards on Sunday in a 49-38 loss to the Browns. Coming into Sunday’s game, they were tied with the Falcons in allowing a league-worst nine touchdown passes, and they allowed three of those on Sunday — two from Baker Mayfield, and one from receiver Jarvis Landry.

Not only has the defense been the primary issue in the team’s 1-3 record, the defense is also wasting quarterback Dak Prescott’s ridiculous hot streak. Prescott has thrown for at least 450 yards in each of his last three games — 450 against the Falcons in a 40-39 win that took everything Dallas had and everything Atlanta didn’t to pull off a remarkable comeback, 472 yards last Sunday in a 38-31 loss to Seattle in which Prescott threw two picks and was out-dueled by Russell Wilson, and Sunday’s loss to the Browns.

In that game, Prescott completed 41 of 58 passes for 502 yards, four touchdowns, and one interception. And with that, he became the third quarterback in NFL history to throw for at least 500 yards and four touchdowns in a game and watch his team lose.

The other two quarterbacks to do it? Detroit’s Matthew Stafford on January 1, 2012 against the Packers in a 45-41 loss. Stafford completed 36 of 59 passes for 520 yards, five touchdown passes, and two interceptions. Problem was, Stafford was outdone by Packers backup quarterback Matt Flynn, who threw six touchdown passes against Detroit’s wafer-thin defense. Flynn parlayed that performance into a large free-agent contract with the Seahawks in the subsequent offseason, which became redundant when he was beaten out in the preseason by a third-round rookie named… Russell Wilson.

The only other quarterback to throw for at least 500 yards and four touchdowns in a game and have his team lose? Avert your eyes, Cowboys fans, because you probably already know the answer. It was Tony Romo on October 6, 2013 (just two days away from an eerie anniversary), when Dallas lost, 51-48, on a last-second field goal from Denver kicker Matt Prater. Romo completed 25 of 36 passes for 506 yards, five touchdowns, and one interception. Romo’s issue is that he was going up against Peyton Manning in the season the Broncos could not be stopped on offense, and this game played to type. Manning completed 33 of 42 passes for 414 yards, four touchdowns, and one interception, and a rushing touchdown as well.

Dak Prescott can hold his head high. It’s not his fault that his team lost. It’s not his fault that he just became the first quarterback in NFL history to throw for more than 450 yards in back-to-back games that turned out to be losses. The goat horns must be placed on defensive coordinator Mike Nolan, and if Nolan doesn’t figure things out with a quickness, the Cowboys’ season is going to go right down the drain at the same time Prescott is going to set all kinds of ridiculous single-season passing records.