With 22 players on the field for every play, save for the occasional mental lapses that leave 10 men on the field even when the middle linebacker notices it and refuses to call a timeout, a team sport can still be broken down into a series of individual matchups.
The Dallas Cowboys (6-4) will have their hands full when they travel to Foxboro, MA to take on the New England Patriots (9-1). It will be Dallas’ biggest game since their playoff ouster against the Rams last season and will be a true litmus test. The Cowboys have the second-best offense in the league and a suspect defense. The Patriots have the best defense in the league and a suspect offense.
Dallas’ defense has playmakers, the Patriots’ offense has Tom Brady. In other words, even the lesser parts can jump up and bite. There will be glorious matchups up and down the field, but here are a few we think fans should pay special attention to.
Jourdan Lewis vs Julian Edelman
Edelman remains Tom Brady’s best weapon, and as Jeff Cavanaugh of 105.3 The Fan points out, he’s not afraid to skirt the line between gritty and foul.
Lewis had already been starting for Anthony Brown before the latter was lost for the season with a triceps tear that required surgery. The former is the Cowboys’ best playmaker who is always near the action, and he’s a fiesty competitor as witnessed by the last-laugh culmination of a battle with a WR similar in stature and style to Edelman, Detroit’s Danny Amendola.
The two squared off in a couple sequences and things got testy along the way. That will probably be the storyline of this week’s matchup against the Super Bowl hero.
Amari Cooper vs Stephon Gilmore
When the Cowboys have the ball, getting it in the hands of Cooper is the No. 1 priority. He currently has 56 receptions for 886 yards and seven touchdowns and is on pace to break his career highs in each category if he can remain healthy for the remainder of the regular season. His 15.8 yards a reception is also a career high and it’s all based on an insane ability to to get open.
The difficult part is that Gilmore is probably the league’s best corner. Unlike Dallas’ No. 1 in Byron Jones, Gilmore travels all over the field to keep tabs on the opposition’s top target. NFL quarterbacks have just a 43.5 passer rating when throwing to a target covered by Gilmore.
There is hope, though. Marquis Brown only saw two targets against Gilmore in Week 9, but caught both. In Week 8, Odell Beckham, Jr. caught 4 of 6 targets for 49 yards and dropped another. Rookie Terry McLaurin got him for three receptions for 51 yards earlier in the year as well.
Gilmore’s true talent is shown by how QBs choose to go away from him, and that may still be Dak Prescott’s best option considering the high level of play out of both Michael Gallup and Randall Cobb.
The Patriots have the best defense, but they haven’t seen an attack the likes of what Dallas is bringing to the table.
Robert Quinn vs Marshall Newhouse
Quinn now has 8.5 sacks on the season after gathering another QB soul in the win over the Detroit Lions. He has been an absolute monster opposite DeMarcus Lawrence, who continues to be one of the most well-rounded, well-respected edge rushers in the game. Lawrence is the total package, Quinn is the true QB Hunter of the defense, and offenses tend to spend a lot of time focusing their efforts on both.
What you’re looking at above is a plotting of edge defenders. On the vertical you have Pass Rush Win Rate, a novel ESPN metric that measures how often a player wins his matchup within 2.5 seconds of the snap. Yes, that’s Quinn at the very top along with Pittsburgh’s TJ Watt (sigh).
But notice how far to the right Quinn is. The horizontal is about how often a player is being double-teamed. The Cowboys Lawrence is second only to the other Watt brother, JJ. Quinn is around seventh in that respect to.
Now for the other side of this matchup, Newhouse. He’s a turnstile.
Pro Football Focus has him as surrendering 29 pressures on the season, blaming him for six sacks of Brady along the way. Batter up.
Michael Bennett / Maliek Collins vs Shaq Mason/Joe Thuney/Ted Karras
While the edge players will be getting their work in and possibly require the Patriots to leave a tight end and/or a back in to block, the real battle should be in the middle of the line. New England has two very capable, very good guards flanking Karras, who is not very good at center. This means that the Cowboys front, which runs twists and games as much as anyone in the league, will look to get creative to get some singling up and try and collapse the pocket on Brady.
Bill Belichick vs Kellen Moore
The Cowboys are slow starters (Bobby Belt Tweet), and it’s time we recognize them for what their offense truly is, a prize fighter. You notice how when champions enter the ring, they spend time feeling their opponent out, to see what will work and what won’t, what the opponent is susceptible to?
That’s Moore’s offense.
Once Dallas figures out the way a defense has scripted their game plan, they’ve almost always been able to exploit that as the game went on.
It’s been true against every opponent in 2019 save for Dennis Allen’s Saints defense. Well, with all due respect to Allen, Belichick is in an entirely different world. It would behoov Dallas to take the gamble early and attack from the opening whistle to stretch the defense early and get the six-headed attack going in the passing game. Pass, pass, pass and then pass some more, and then when they finally give in, put Elliott and Pollard to work.
The Cowboys have an offensive EPA of 134.3 on the year, second-best in the league to the only team that was able to solve the Patriots defensive riddle, the Ravens. Their quarterback is a dual-threat, and while Prescott can run he doesn’t do it as a primary option very often. We’ll see if Moore borrows that from Baltimore’s plan of attack.
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