Tony Romo, Tough ‘08 Matchups and Who Needs a 2nd Receiver? K.C. Joyner Returns, Part II
June 30, 2008
Today, K.C. turns his attention to the offensive side of the ball.
BSR: Last year your write up of Tony Romo said he was probably NFL QB at intermediate range throws. How would you rate his ‘07 game. Did he improve, regress or stay about the same?
Joyner: I think he regressed a little bit. His bad decisions increased. I think teams forced him to be more patient, to be willing to go down the field in 10 to 12 yard throws. He wasn’t always willing to do this, as you saw in the Buffalo game.
BSR: I’m amazed at the amount of abuse he gets because the Cowboys lost to the Giants. He’s only played one full season in the league and he’s sometimes portrayed as a failure, as if he’s got this long habit of choking that he needs to overcome.
Joyner: I know what you’re saying. I remember when he dropped the field goal snap in Seattle in ‘06 and people were telling me his career was over, and I remember saying, “no, that’s a good NFL quarterback.”
He’s not the guy who’s going to be the benefit of the doubt. When Peyton Manning started in Indy, he was the cornerstone. They had a ton invested him and he had a reputation for being the hardest working guy on the team, so even though he had trouble in his early playoffs he was given a lot of slack.
The press sees Romo with starlets and they see Joe Namath. He’s not given a lot of slack.
Roger Staubach was an excellent quarterback but he lost Super Bowl 10 to the Steelers, he lost to them in ‘77 when Dallas won the title, he lost Super Bowl 13 the following year and lost Super Bowl 13 and a half in ‘79. He was 0-4 against Terry Bradshaw and the Steelers but you never hear, “oh, Roger could never beat the Steelers.”
BSR: Adam Schefter of the NFL Network reported that Dallas was supposedly interested in Joe Horn. Does he have anything left?
Joyner: Joe Horn did not have enough attempts to qualify for my ratings but his numbers were between five and six, which are not good.
I have to wonder why they feel they need another complementary receiver. I have a new rating this year, where I look at how a receiver did against three different classes of corners. I classify any CB with a YPA below 7 yards as a red corner, a CB with a YPA between 7 and 9 as a yellow corner and any corner with a YPA above 9 as a green corners. Reds are matchups you tend to avoid, yellows you attack with caution and greens are great matchups for a quarterback.
Last year, Patrick Crayton had a 5.4 YPA against red corners, which is not very good. But his YPA against yellow CBs and against green CBs was above nine. Now a YPA around ten will usually rate a receiver at the top of the league.
This means that when he was not matched up against elite corners, Patrick Crayton was a very effective receiver.
Look, Terrell Owens will probably have 150 passes thrown his way. Jason Witten will get another 100 to 120. Crayton will probably get 90 to 100 balls. The running backs and backup tight ends will get maybe 60 or so. That’s just over 400 attempts. How much will Dallas need another receiver?
Here’s another reason why I wonder if Dallas needs another receiver. I used the red/yellow/green system to rate the matchups each QB will face in ‘08, giving a zero every time a QB faces a red CB, one point for a yellow CB and two for a green one.
Tony Romo has the lowest matchup total for any QB entering 2008, meaning he faces the hardest schedule passing wise. When the Cowboys coaches look at their opponents I think they’ll rely on their running game more this season. Now, every other NFC East QB will also have a tough road, but Romo has the most difficult schedule, period.
BSR: How do you rate Dallas’ chances, given Romo’s matchup problems? 2007 came to a disappointing end but I never wavered from my belief that the ‘07 Cowboys were not going all the way. Their defense was not finished. I think they’re close enough to being complete this time. They didn’t match up against New England and could not match the Giants in producing a rush with four men.
Joyner: I think the Cowboys have an excellent chance. They have arguably the most talented team in the NFC, with San Diego being arguably the most talented team in the AFC.
BSR: Careful, K.C., you’re stealing my thunder. Dallas and San Diego meet in their first pre-season games and I see them squaring off again in the Super Bowl. Thanks again for joining us.
– K.C. Joyner will be featured in a BSR podcast later this week to answer more questions, promote “Scientific Football 2008,” his new cornerback tracking service and “Blindsided,” a new book which aims to puncture several football myths. If you have a question for K.C., post it in the thread.
Comments
13 Responses to “Tony Romo, Tough ‘08 Matchups and Who Needs a 2nd Receiver? K.C. Joyner Returns, Part II”
Got something to say?
You must be logged in to post a comment.
-
"The Sports Doctors"
iTunes/
Winamp
Windows
Media
RealOne -
Cowboy Up
Dedicated to providing the best Cowboys analysis anywhere, our efforts are free of charge but not free of expense. Your kind donation today will keep our drive alive.
Thank you
Or mail payment to:
RV2 Enterprises
P.O. Box 150093
Austin TX 78715-0093
Advertisers
OnlineSeats.com
Dallas Cowboys Tickets
Dallas Mavericks TicketsRelated Sites
-
Fave it!
-
SiteMeter
Burst Media
Make sure that you tell K.C. that we really appreciate his insight. In some perverted way, I feel a sense of pride that we (actually you, Rafael) kinda discovered him.
Thanks again for a great insight.
I guess the whole hullbaloo behind the outcry of needing another quality receiver is what will happen when TO gets hurt. To me it is not if TO gets hurt, but when. Then - assuming Glenn doesn’t play this year - won’t Crayton be matched up against #1 cornerbacks? In which case we’re doomed. Or would then Hurd/Austin/Stanback go head-to-head against the opposing team’s best DB? Either way, Romo will be hurting if past performance is any guide. I know you can’t go through life wishing no one gets injured, but TO has a strong injury history, and he really has helped Romo become the player that he is today.
What the heck did we do when Michael Irvin was the team’s only reliable receiver? Luckily he was an iron man and never was hurt, or was always ready to play (at least after 1990). He was also relatively young during that time, as opposed to the mid-30s TO. From 1991 to 1998, the only games he missed were due to suspension, and that led to the defending champs starting out 2-3. Yeah, Irvin was pretty indispensible. Playmaker!
What happens if Romo gets hurt? What happens if Witten gets hurt? What happens if Ware gets hurt? What happens if Folk gets hurt …
I’d like to see T.O.’s YPA against red corners. Who’s the best WR against reds?
I think T.O. is going to change his game this season. Unlike Plaxico, T.O. knows what he has to do to play at a high level, so I expect him to initiate less contact than before.
“TO has a strong injury history, and he really has helped Romo become the player that he is today.”
Romo has made Romo the player that he is. Reference Jeff Garcia and Donovan McNabb. Also reference Romo’s play without a T.O. that is 100%.
What happens if Witten gets hurt? What happens if Ware gets hurt? What happens if Folk gets hurt..
Those guys aren’t in their mid-30’s like T.O. and Glenn, who also have histories of injury. Relying on receivers that old is something only a GM who doesn’t answer to anyone would do. The likelihood that one or both of those receivers will be injured is much higher than the players that you mentioned.
Just my opinion.
I think the West Coast offense made Garcia the way he is.
I agree with everyone saying that if TO goes down that it would make Dallas’s offense hurt.
There isn’t too many offenses that would be good if their #1 went down in the NFL though.
We just have to hope that if TO gets injured its not bad.
Rick71,
My question to you is that who would Dallas have gotten that would’ve been reliable? The GM that no one answers too was trying his best to get a veteran WR by trade, but no one would bite. They could have drafted a rookie, but none were good enough to go in the first round.
Sure you could fault them for not taking a WR a couple of years ago and start developing but lets look at the the wideouts the past three years.
Dwayne Bowe, Steve Smith, Meacham
Bowe had a good year, but at the time Dallas didn’t know what was going to happen with Gregg Ellis.
Dallas could have taken Holmes the year before that, i will give you that.
HOWEVER as you take a shot at Jerry, remember who was calling the shots that year. Or most of them.. and that would be Bill Parcells who was in love with Bobby Carpenter.
The year before that he was calling most of the shots too and the year before that.
So… when was the last time Jerry Jones had a pure, just him draft?
That would be in 03, when he got Newman in the first and Al Johnson in the second.
Only WR to come out worth a damn was Boldin who no one projected as being that good and was taken long after Dallas’s pick. However Jerry did pick up Jason Witten.. but I suppose he could have always picked up a WR like Kevin Curtis instead…. would have been a great plan.
In 02′ Dallas did pick up a WR, Antonio Bryant, in the second. The guy was talented but a completed nut job… and after that Deion Branch was the only WR taken that was really any good.
So Rick, while I think Dallas could use another WR, the facts of the matter is that its not exactly all Jerry’s fault that they don’t have a younger one developing… and then again how do you know they don’t?
Its not like you can just dial up and have a great young wr at will. And even if you moved up to take the next “SUPERSTAR”, how do you know he’s not Peter Warrick, or Charles Rogers?
With his injury history and age,it’s far more likely that Owens will get hurt than Romo, Ware or Witten.
True David, but all you can do is worry about it.
Jerry tried to get another vet to put on the other side of him. All you can hope is that Dallas has developed one of these young guys. Also it might help if Dallas has more versatility running that ball and gets better special teams play.
AirForceBat, 10 wide receivers went in the draft between our first and second pick. I wouldn’t have spent a first round pick on a running back, especially one who was second string in college. You make some very good points, and you’re right that there’s no way to know if a player, especially a receiver, is going to be a bust or the next T.O. For me, James Hardy was worthy of one of our first two picks. Limas Sweed would have fit in nicely. Again, it is months before the season starts, and time will tell on the two receivers that I named as well as whether T.O. gets hurt or not. If he does, I think it would have been nice to have a young receiver who was from a big-time college who would need less time to adapt.
I like Jerry and think he is the best owner in the league. But, I don’t like him as a GM. This team would be even more incredible if he could focus all of his efforts on marketing the team and the stadium and leave the managing to a real football person who had worked his way up the ladder through years of work as a scout, coach, etc. Again, just my opinion. I’m not a GM and don’t pretend to be one, unlike our owner.
You have noticed that Hardy appears to be already going down the tubes behavior wise right?
Sweed might have been a good one to pick- but we needed CBs and since we traded away our #2 TE we had to replace him as well.
TO has not had that bad of an injury history- outside of the infamous Horse Collar when has he missed more then a game or so?
Granted he was not as effective late last year- but that has been pretty rare for him.
rick,
I suppose you can look at it one or two ways. Supposedly the coaching staff thought that there wasn’t a WR that was there for their selection that would contribute faster then the guys they have on their roster.
As far as Felix Jones being a backup for McFadden… he would have started on almost any other team in the nation. The only reason he wasn’t the starter was because of McFadden.
Barry Sanders was Thurman Thomas’s backup until Thomas left, Maroney was Barbers backup until Barber left.
Your right he was second string, but lets not act like he was chopped liver. The guy had an insane YPC and it wasn’t against crap defenses. This was the SEC.
We discussed this ad nauseum before, during and post draft. There are two things you have gotta get rick71. There were no,none ,zero,zip recievers that would have been an upgrade this year besides our true need at the time (pre adam jones being allowed to practice) was corner plain and simple. The second thing you need to remember is that Marion was not signed and it appeared a hold out was at least possible which left us with really no running backs at the time. Now you need to remember we had 7 recievers on the roster and with that same group our offense decimated all prior cowboys passing records. Yes if TO goes down it will be scary but we could say that about a bunch of key players . We just have to keep our fingers crossed that the youngins step up and that TO stays strong.
Tex is really bothered by Brian Stewart. The annoying and unqualified coach is the weak link in the entire organization. He should have been blown out for Capers, but threw a fit and survived. Talk about bringing a knife to a gun fight.