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Cowboys by the Numbers — The Secondary

Three Eagles receivers — Greg Lewis, Hank Baskett and DeSean Jackson — had 100 yard games against the Rams.  The Cowboys corners shackled Braylon Edwards and Kellen Winslow.  Something has to give.

Here are the cornerback coverage lines:

player	att.	comp.	yds.	YPA	Def.	drops, yds.	pen.
Anthony Henry	9	2	16	1.8	3	1 (25)	0
Adam Jones	6	2	20	3.3	1	1 (5)	1
Orlando Scandrick	2	1	9	4.5	0	0	0

Those are stellar lines for each corner, though they’re artificially high thanks to Braylon Edward’s butter fingers. He dropped the lone pass where a Cleveland receiver got behind the Cowboys secondary and two in the game.

– Anthony Henry was the top target. The Browns went at him six times in the first quarter alone and nine times during the game. His strong start pushed Rob Chudzinki and Derek Anderson to target other corners. Four passes to Edwards netted zero yards. Henry tackled Edwards on a smoke route for no gain, got a break when Edwards dropped a 25 yard bomb, then broke up a pass and defended a fade in the end zone.

Henry’s yards came when he covered Winslow. The tight end beat Henry on a deep in for 15 yards and Henry left Winslow in the end zone, allowing the Brown to catch a one yard pass for Cleveland’s lone TD.

– Adam Jones got more attention as the game proceeded and did fairly well. That yardage and completion line includes a three yard interference call in the end zone, where he let Edwards cross his face on a square in and tackled the receiver while Anderson’s pass was in the air.

Jones had a breakup and was ready to tackle Edwards on a five yard stop where the receiver dropped the ball. The lone reception came in the 4th quarter, when Jones’ man got behind him on a deep out.

– Orlando Scandrick was sound.  He missed a tackle on an Edwards curl but Zach Thomas cleaned up after a nine yard gain.  He had solid coverage on a fade to Edwards that Anderson tossed too high and out of bounds.

Dallas kept the Cleveland stars under control and the Cowboys corner trio played a big part in that.  I don’t think the Eagles backups — Jackson, Baskett and Lewis are the Eagles’ 3rd, 4th and 5th receivers (Reggie Brown and Kevin Curtis are hurt) — will terrorize the Dallas wideouts.  Tackling will be key.  The Eagles will throw a lot more short passes and I expect them to complete quite a few.  If the Cowboys’ corners wrap up quickly and limit short throws to short gains, they should be okay, whether Terence Newman plays or not.

How ‘Bout That NFC?!

I’m watching the Bears smack the Colts around and I wonder if the NFL’s center of gravity is shifting? Consider the AFC/NFC matchups this weekend:

• Dallas 28, Cleveland 10
• Carolina 26, San Diego 24
• Buffalo 34, Seattle 10
• Chicago 29, Indianapolis 13

Yeah, it’s week one, but look at the assumed cream of the AFC. The Patriots are in disarray, fearful that Tom Brady could be lost for the year with an ACL tear. Carolina didn’t play Steve Smith and still stunned the Chargers. The Colts are sputtering with a rusty Peyton Manning under center. They look a half step slow in comparison to the swarming Bears.

Only Pittsburgh looked dominant in the AFC today. It’s early, but we may be witnessing the AFC dropping back to the NFC’s level, which means the Super Bowl race is truly wide open.

Three Factoids That May Shape the Cowboys-Browns Bottom Line

1. New DL coach Todd Grantham is already paying dividends, getting Marcus Spears to play far above his Kacey Rogers-era level and getting Tank Johnson into opposing backfields with regularity this preseason.

He may pay another dividend — as a spy. Grantham was Cleveland’s defensive coordinator last year and has as much insight into the Browns defensive capabilities and thinking as anybody in the Cowboys meeting room. I’m guessing he’s spent some time talking to the offensive coaches the last two weeks.

2. We’ve heard since OTAs that the Cowboys are working on nickel and especially dime packages that line up Anthony Henry inside, on opposing tight ends.

You won’t have to wait long to see them. As I pointed out in Thurday’s piece on Jason Witten, the Browns use TE Kellen Winslow Jr. as a wide receiver. He was “flexed” off the line, or lined up as a receiver on 75% of Cleveland’s plays last year, easily the most for any NFL tight end.

Dallas usually slides Terence Newman inside when it plays nickel, but the Browns signed speedster Donte Stallworth this offseason to pair with Braylon Edwards. In effect, they’re running a three-WR base set, with the 6′4″, 250 lb. Winslow as their slot option.

There’s no way Dallas is going to stay in their base and put Roy Williams in coverage against Winslow. The Cowboys may open in their nickel with Henry over the tight end and Newman and Adam Jones lining up over the wideouts.

3. How well would the Cowboys do against their offense? And vice versa? I’ve watched the Browns the last three weeks and notice their packages and offensive plays greatly mirror Dallas’. Cleveland OC Rob Chudzinski and Cowboys OC Jason Garrett are both aggressive play callers with gunslinger QBs who like to throw down the field.

Tony Romo had the third-highest percentage of bad decisions among starting QBs last year. Derek Anderson had the second-highest percentage. The difference is that Romo was more accurate and had a solidly higher YPA and a significantly higher SYPA (success % times YPA). Whichever defense is better able to throw their opposing QB out of his confort zone and press him into more bad decisions will have a huge edge.

4. Bonus crumb — A review of the Vikings video showed Alan Ball making several tackles as a gunner on the punt coverage teams. With Miles Austin and Sam Hurd hurt, Ball bought himself a longer stay with his special special-teams play.

Avert Your Eyes Children!

The words “Bill Belichick” and “sex tape” should never be in the same sentence. But they are.

Way. Too. Much. Information… (shudder)

Trading Black Hats for White Ones — Or Not?

Duane Thomas once commented that the Dallas Cowboys have never won anything without controversy. Thomas of course generated his fair share of it, but he has a point. Let’s look at some of the Cowboys’ championship seasons and consider the distractions that accompanied each one:

1971 — 1970 Rookie of the Year Thomas is traded during the preseason, has his trade to New England reversed after a bustup with Pats’ coach John Mazur, returns and then plays the season without speaking to his teammates. Meanwhile, Tom Landry employs a quarterback rotation system, which craters in week seven when he alternates Roger Staubach and Craig Morton on each offensive play in an embarrassing loss to a bad Chicago Bears team.

The offense settles down after Staubach is named the starter and the Cowboys run the table.

1993 — The Cowboys have little time to celebrate their third title before Emmitt Smith and Jerry Jones stage a contract showdown. Smith holds out and Dallas stumbes into the season with two losses. The team settles down and swaggers through the playoffs, though it has to overcome several key injuries, namely Mark Stepnoski’s ACL tear, Smith’s separated shoulder and Troy Aikman’s concussion, which wipes out his memory of the Super Bowl.

Simmering beneath the surface is the rift between Jones and Jimmy Johnson, which erupts almost immediately after they accept their second Lombardi trophy. Jimmy clumsily dodges a question in the locker room about his readiness to pursue a third consecutive title and days later mocks Jones on The Tonight Show. The J.J.s part shortly thereafter.

1995 — Dallas pursues it’s third title of the Jones era with the widely-despised Barry Switzer at the helm. Jones picks a fight with the league over sponsorship deals and is served with a lawsuit during a league meeting. The Cowboys are ripped for “buying a title” after they outbid San Francisco for Deion Sanders’ services. The cries for Switzer’s dismissal peak after his two 4th-and-1 gambles fail in Philadelphia. When Dallas beats the Steelers in the Super Bowl the sighs of relief are as loud as the cheers.

It seems the Cowboys require discord to fuel their title runs. Perhaps that’s why the Terry Glenn tiff feels like home; I’d be far more worried if everything were hunky dory.

I think many Cowboys fans feel the same way. One character trait I’ve noticed in the three plus years of running this site is that the Cowboys nation cannot exist without creating villains on their own team.

Look at the Parcells years. Drew Bledsoe was always the instant scapegoat, even when losses were not directly his fault. More recently, Julius Jones served as a whipping boy for the fans.

Even today, with the Cowboys coming off a 13-3 season, there are several black hats riding in the posse. I give you the Cowboys you love to hate, ‘08 edition:

• Roy Williams
• Terry Glenn
• Marcus Spears
• Bobby Carpenter

and give you these potential baddies:

• Wade Phillips
• Tony Romo
• Anthony Henry
• Adam Jones
• Tank Johnson

a former black hat gone straight:

• Flozell Adams

and these wild cards:

• Greg Ellis
• Terrell Owens

Too much controversy? Too many loose cannons? From my perspective, the blend looks great. The Cowboys thrive on crazy and Jerry has done his best the past two years to raise the instability quotient. Outsiders may deride his gambles on T.O. and the former Pacman Jones but team history suggests he’s right where he needs to be.

Baby Steps — The NFL Network Names Papa Lead Announcer

Football viewing just got a lot more enjoyable.

The NFL Network announced that long-time Giants play-by-play man Bob Papa will succeed Bryant Gumbel on the network’s broadcasts. I listen to a lot of games on Sirius radio and Papa stands out as one of the league’s better game callers. He has a pleasant voice and is all about the game.

He’s worlds better than the stuffy Gumbel, who is perhaps the only announcer whose narration could turn a porn film into a soporific. The man droned! What’s worse, Gumbel had this annoying habit of using baseball analogies and cliches to describe football situations. That’s like repeatedly discussing your last girlfriend in front of your new one. If you’re calling a football game, speak of it in footballese. Please.

First, ESPN dumped Joe Theismann.  Now, the league shows Gumbel the door.

Baby steps, people.  Baby steps.

New and Better Toys

The changes keep coming here at BSR.

– First, we’re going on the air. My radio partner Luis Rios and I have reached an agreement to create a training camp radio show for KSOX, the Espn affiliate in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas. We will have time Tuesday through Friday with an option to continue through the season.

I’m not sure of the fine points at this time but I’m hoping they’ll stream the show over the net and offer a toll free number for call ins so all you BSR regulars can listen and call in. I’ll keep you posted as the program develops.

– Check out the new E-Bay widget in the lower right hand corner, which shows Cowboys tickets for sale on their site. We get a cut from E-Bay’s cut on any tickets bought on a click-through from this site. It gives you a chance to help us while you help yourself.

Dallas May Be America’s Team…

but the Patriots are Hungary’s Team, dammit!

Check out this site.

It seems the Hungarians also love themselves some Pittsburgh Steelers. The Cowboys, based on visitors, are mid-pack.

Submit Your Questions

… for my upcoming podcast with K.C. Joyner in the thread.

There are a lot of cornerback comparisons being submitted at this time, so I thought I would conduct my own. I’ve put together a spread sheet with the YPA averages for all NFC East CBs and some for CBs on other highly regarded units, like Denver’s, San Diego’s and Green Bay’s from 2004 through 2006.

I’m eagerly awaiting my copy of Scientific Football 2008 to factor in last year’s scores. I can tell you already that Philadelphia’s corners don’t match up to Dallas’. How do the Cowboys stack up against the rest of the field? Stay tuned.

I’m also going to list the top ten CBs by YPA over that four year span. I can also tell you that Terence Newman will rate veeeeery well but don’t yet know just how well.

Tabloid Tuesday — Pam Anderson, Jessica Simpson and DeSean Jackson

Never thought you would see those names together, did you?

– DeSean Jackson is upsetting some Eagles fans with his effusive praise of ’90s Cowboys greats. Nothing against the kid, but if he is in fact that second coming of Freddie Mitchell that’s okay with me.

– If you’re going to play the Tony and Jessica star-gazing game, link to the pros — the Brits.

Pam Anderson has aimed both guns at Jessica Simpson, calling her names and making accusations this family site can’t repeat.

What will Tony do? What will he say? Can we get all three of them in that Australian Big Brother house? And if we could, who do you bet on — Daisy Duke or Borat’s girl?

Bring the popcorn, T.O.

The Blue Album

This is Spinal Tap viewers will recall the band’s opus “Smell the Glove” was delayed because the original cover, showing a woman having a gloved hand shoved in her face, was deemed sexist. It was reworked as the famous — or infamous — “Black Album.”

Press in the Metroplex are composing what I’ll term The Blue Album, with the working title “Smell the Jock.”

Tony Romo, Tough ‘08 Matchups and Who Needs a 2nd Receiver? K.C. Joyner Returns, Part II

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.

Widgets? We Ain’t Got No Widgets…

…we don’t need no widgets!

I don’t have to show you any stinkin’ widgets!

Ah, but you DO need widgets.

And we’ve GOT some stinkin’ widgets!

Look down in the lower left hand column. Get your BSR widget, and ensure you won’t miss a single report from camp.

If you don’t, Fred C. Dobbs gets it!

Coming Attactions, Rock-Hard Performance Boosters and a Final Camp Pitch

– The NFL year is heading farther into the dead zone, with the coaches due to take their vacations before the camp grind begins. The team did release its camp schedule so we have a target. Workouts begin on July 25th, just four weeks from today.

We’re not slowing down here at BSR. I’m interviewing K.C. Joyner tonight and will publish his comments over the weekend. We’ll be talking about Adam Jones, the Cowboys secondary in general, T.O., possible second wideouts, Tony Romo and a host of other topics.

K.C. will also discuss Scientific Football 2008, which is about to be released, and a new cornerback tracking feature that his web site will feature this year. Check in for that.

We’re also going to talk about Cowboys fandom with the folks at Barry Switzer Ate My Hamster Too, better known as The Hamster, a U.K.-based Cowboys fanzine that’s been around since the mid ’90s. The lads will tell us what it’s like to root for the good team from almost half way around the globe. I wonder if they have any Page 3 girls for their fanzine? Hmmmm, I wonder if we can get some Page 3 girls for BSR!? (Page 3 Girls are a “feature” of The Sun, the biggest daily “red top” in England. Warning — may not be work safe.)

– They’re not just corking their bats any more — A few years ago, when Viagra was first introduced, an NBA official joked that “the league should test for a lot of drugs but if it really wants to scare the players, it should announce its testing for Viagra.”

Seems there might be something to that line. Sports officials now think the little blue pill might enhance on-field performance. The major sports leagues might just have to test for it after all — or put medicine jars full of them in every trainers room!

Viva Viagra indeed.

Finally — we’re in the home stretch of our fund drive. We’re at $1,835 now and are closing in on $2,000, which is the amount which would make it comfortable for me to cover all two initial weeks of camp. I’m closing the drive on Monday, so pitch in if you can and help us reach our goal.

A big thanks to the generous people who have already donated. We won’t let you down.

Tony Romo — Clothes Horse?

Years ago, in a past life, I used to teach video production at a major Midwestern university. This was in the mid ’90s, when Starter ran an ad promoting their sports hats which featured several young men mugging for the camera and mouthing an irritating ditty that began, “first you twist the hat, then you turn the hat…”

You then did a hundred other things with the hat. The ad so saturated the target markets’ collective consciousness that nearly every backwards-baseball cap-wearing frat boy in the class used this commercial as their model for the first assignment — a short, ten-shot video clip. The “parodies” were so numerous and so brain dead that all the instructors banned them, before we were driven to strike our eyes out.

I bring this up because the Sports Business Journal announced Monday that Starter is nearing a deal with Romo that would make him the highest paid shoe and apparel endorser in the league. The match is ideal; Romo is the Peter Pan of the frat-boy set, the 28 year old QB who still wears his cap backwards and probably will when he’s in a rocking chair.

On a more abstract level, the Romo deal reminds us, yet again, of a painful truth: the NFL and fashion don’t mix.

Now, hold your cards and letters. I’m not talking about actual game items like jerseys, which can be stylish in the right context. I’m talking about the league’s regrettable forays into daily apparel.

Let’s begin with those abstract abominations that all coaches have to wear on the sidelines. The NFL apparel folks have calmed down in recent years, giving us more simpler shirts and sweaters, but in the Jimmy/Barry days of the ’90s, the geometry got out of hand:

Barry’s league-mandated attire is a far cry from the simple, understated team color- matching outfits Tom Landry wore on the sidelines. Imagine if Tom had continued coaching into the ’90s. He too would have been outfitted in shirts like this.

It just doesn’t fit, does it? When Mike Nolan offered the league a chance to revive the suits and ties Landry and Hank Stram wore in the ’60s and ’70s, he was initially turned down.

The No-Fun-League label apparently extends to coaches garb too.

Of course, coaching attire looks classic next to that all time football-related mistake — zubaz pants.

The zebra warmup look was also big in the mid-’90s. Nobody should have worn them and the league would have done society a favor by banning them from stadiums or at least from being worn by anybody with a waist larger than 34 inches.

They became so ubiquitous that a major men’s magazine put them atop a list of items for men to avoid.

And don’t think for a second that we’re free of the zubaz scourge. They’re part of the official clothing line for this summer’s Republican National Convention. Take a pot shot at the GOP on this one if that’s your inclination. I’ll blame the NFL.

So you see, Romo’s past fashion sense and the league’s fashion faux-pas have me concerned that parts of the upcoming line could be stone-cold cringeworthy. The last Romo-related attempt at NFL fashion has been sent so deep down the memory hole it could suck the universe in behind it. How could you forget:

That’s official league issue folks. Note the NFL shield, the team name and the star mark on the sleeve. These pink beauties were sold on the team’s site last year. Now, I understand, they’re almost impossible to find.

I don’t know if the team snapped up the remaining stock after the vicious public reaction following the Cowboys’ loss to Philly or the Simpson clan bought up every last one to keep them off the market. Whatever the case, I hope, for Tony Romo’s sake and for those who will buy his sponsored apparel, that the Romo line proves more lucky and more lasting than Jessica’s pink jersey.

And I hope for my sake that the Starter people don’t try to re-invent casual male fashion with Romo-Wear. I taught college boys once. Seeing men my age sporting the Tony Romo forever-frat boy look might drive me insane.

In Other News:

– The Rams are rumored to be considering a move back to Los Angeles after the 2014 season, given an escape clause in their St. Louis lease that will kick in if the team’s stadium revenue is not in the top quarter.

• Cowboys Tickets on eBay

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• Burst Media

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