[h=1]Cowboys Weekend Riffing: Week 15 at Indianapolis – and diagnosing the red-zone issues[/h]
By Bob Sturm 1h ago
142 days since training camp opened in Oxnard, 51 days until Super Bowl 53 in Atlanta, and just two more days until the Week 15 trip to Indianapolis to take on the Colts at noon….
The Cowboys are red-hot entering Sunday’s rare cross-conference showdown as the 2018 season turns toward its final stretch. 2017 was a very disappointing campaign, and the first several weeks of 2018 appeared different, but lousy in their own way. Now the team is on fire and seems to be on a fast track for the postseason. How did they quickly flip a switch from lousy to where they are now as the team nobody wants to play? Theories abound. But they are in a really good spot presently, after everyone left them for dead weeks back.
The 2018 Indianapolis Colts have followed a similar formula. After starting 1-5, nobody expected the Colts to dream about playoff games. Since 1990, 97 teams have started 1-5 and only one, the 2015 Kansas City Chiefs, made the playoffs. But they have worked their way up the standings by winning six of their last seven and are poised to push their way right into the AFC tournament. They badly need Sunday’s game.
The Cowboys and Colts have followed a somewhat similar path to this point in the road over the last 24 months, and for me, this will be a fantastic opportunity for Jason Garrett to demonstrate why he is the man for this job. I have always claimed the biggest objective for a head coach when it comes to the game itself is to find a way to instill in his men the emotional understanding of what level each game demands. The Cowboys consistently play hard and seem to rise up for their biggest games. But after the five weeks or so of new emotional challenges each week, is this one ripe for a letdown? Look at the stretch they have been on:
November 11th – Sunday night football in Philadelphia with the season hanging by a string.
November 18th – A revenge opportunity, returning to the site of last year’s demise in Atlanta.
November 22nd – Thanksgiving Day versus a divisional rival that beat you one month earlier.
November 29th – A chance to spring the biggest home upset of Garrett era against the Saints with whole NFL watching.
December 9th – The battle for the NFC East crown and a chance to end the Eagles’ run on top.
Seldom will you see five consecutive weeks where the schedule takes care of the emotion all by itself. It doesn’t require a big speech or grand gestures. The team was not going to struggle to get up for those tests.
But we know how this sport works. We also know that at some point, emotional play exhausts a team’s peak energy. Will it happen Sunday? It’s a noon game against an AFC team that you have no venom for and seldom see, and the opponent desperately needs the game — more than you. The Cowboys have been told just how great they are all week. Their urgency level has also dropped considerably now that it appears Washington and Philadelphia are doomed. For the first time in a huge stretch, the human emotion of desperation may not be on the Cowboys’ side when they take the field against a team that is probably in their same tier.
Either the Cowboys are up for it when toe meets leather at 12:01 central time Sunday, or the good times will end this week in Indianapolis. If I am Jason Garrett, I think hard about what I say to the team Saturday night and Sunday morning to try to push any emotional buttons I can think of.
Let’s look at some of the key matchups that will decide this game, with the benefit of our “nickel down” roster charts below. When a team needs a third down,
thanks to our graphics man Skyler Thiot, here is what the two lineups might look like.
[h=3]
WHEN THE COWBOYS HAVE THE BALL[/h]
For the sake of discussion, let’s assume Zack Martin will play on Sunday (the benefit of the doubt goes to players who have never missed a game), but each team has a key offensive lineman who is an outstanding player. Both are game-time decisions.
Here are the Cowboys’ offensive rankings:
It is interesting, of course, to see how badly the Cowboys buried themselves in September and October. Since the Amari Cooper trade, they aren’t 20th in total offense. They are actually ninth. They are not 25th in passing, they are 10th. They are not 32rd in points, but 12th. They are not 12th on third downs, but actually second. Now, the red zone (32nd) and the sack (28th) rankings remain poor, but surely that should raise some optimism about the true identity of this offense. Yes, they are still missing some big opportunities, but the offense in Dallas for six weeks now does not resemble what was going on before the trade.
This week they square off against a very young Colts defense and one that can really put some speed on the field. No team in the NFL has played more rookie snaps in 2018 than the Colts, who are trying to completely remake their roster and benefited nicely from the Sam Darnold trade last April. Not only did they completely rebuild their offensive line, but they also overhauled their defensive front. On Sunday in nickel situations, you will see 2018 second-round rookies Darius Leonard, Tyquan Lewis, and Kemoko Turay all take the field and make a difference. They are young and with Matt Eberflus at the helm, they will have an idea of what Dallas likes to do.
Prescott will definitely want to be sure he knows where the Colts safeties are, as 2017 first-round pick Malik Hooker (still 22 years old) can cover plenty of ground in center field and seems more like a cornerback playing safety. Up front, the Colts have several under-rated veterans in their rotation. SMU’s Margus Hunt and Mississippi State’s Denico Autry are both having their best professional season with the Colts this year, and the well-traveled Jabaal Sheard is nearing 50 career sacks and is always around the QB. I assume he will be testing La’el Collins all day long.
We know the Eberflus coaching style with all of his Rod Marinelli influences. Nobody blitzes less in the NFL this season than the Colts’ 14.9% rate. In particular, they are dead last in pressure calls on third down, and certainly want to make you show patience and drive the ball down the field rather than getting beat big. As you know, this might actually play nicely into the Cowboys’ strengths if they can be efficient on third downs and the red zone.
And, yes, if there was a week where settling for field goals at the end of long drives will probably get you beat, this will be the week.
[h=3]
WHEN THE COLTS HAVE THE BALL[/h]
Of all of the hot takes 2018 has brought, I most regret reading too much into the early weeks of Andrew Luck’s return season and deducing that his arm might be forever shredded. He missed all of 2017 and the league was on full alert when he was being sheltered heavily in training camp and then was just dumping the ball out quickly over and over again without his patented deep shots and big plays early. There was even the oddity of being replaced for a Hail Mary throw in Philadelphia, which really got us all worked up.
Thankfully, those concerns have proven to be ridiculous. Luck is back, and in some ways, better than ever. Frank Reich has proven to be a strong hire and, in particular, his grasp for designing a quick-hitting offense that moves the chains and keeps a QB from taking a beating is on full display.
The Colts led the NFL in sacks allowed from 2016-2017. 100 sacks against in two seasons had everyone blaming their QB for holding the ball too much (even though they ended up starting a few different QBs.) This is where I think it is important for me to raise my disagreement with this new analytic claim that sacks are a QB stat. The theory is that a QB can control if he is sacked by merely getting rid of the ball. Now, it might take 3,000 words to fully make my point, but I think Luck going from the most-sacked QB in 2016 to nearly the least-sacked QB in 2018 (which was his very next season) demonstrates the many elements that go into sacks — from offensive line personnel to scheme, execution, and yes, the QB’s trigger to get the ball out.
If you think it is a just QB stat as many in the football analytics community insist, you lessen the impact of drafting the spectacular Quenton Nelson out of Notre Dame at the top of the 2018 draft, then Braden Smith out of Auburn in Round 2. Add that to the return of excellent center Ryan Kelly (who is racing to get healthy for Sunday) and then you have substantially upgraded three of the five offensive line positions. Now, bring in Reich’s quick-hitting scheme, and presto — the QB is no longer getting sacked. He is recently coming off a six-week stretch where he was sacked just once in 193 pass attempts! These pieces of evidence make it difficult for me to blame sacks on the QB alone. He plays a role, but I might divide it into thirds: 33% QB, 33% competent OL play, and 33% scheme. Of course, each particular sack will move those percentages, but as a whole, I see it like this and therefore don’t buy ESPN’s QBR, which heavily debits sacks on the ledger of the QB.
Regardless of that mini-rant, we should know that the Colts do their damage through the air, primarily with old familiar names like the great T.Y. Hilton — who will absolutely destroy your game plan by getting loose a time or two downfield. He also brings down contested catches as well as anyone this side of Antonio Brown. He is an amazing player who has been overlooked in recent years, but that is our fault. He is still as awesome as ever.
Add to that the breakout season of Eric Ebron, who was drafted right before Odell Beckham in Detroit and then was a frustrating part of their offense for four years. Surely, if Matthew Stafford and that attack couldn’t figure him out, maybe there was nothing to figure out. Well, he took the short ride to Indy for two years and $13 million, and with 12 touchdowns in 13 weeks, has already exceeded his four-year touchdown total in Detroit (11). He is someone to take careful note of, as probably the second-most likely target of Luck’s reads.
The Dallas defense is playing at a very high level, but on Sunday they will have to take their show on the road again, curtail the explosive plays and to try to turn this into a slugfest. Tackling well in the open field will be vital and forcing a few takeaways would be a key objective. I think this is a spot for the linebackers to continue their big season, particularly as Sean Lee potentially joins the existing Leighton Vander Esch-Jaylon Smith mix.
For me, this is yet another great test for the Cowboys. I think a loss would likely lock in the No. 4 seed (rather than sustaining the hope of leapfrogging Chicago), but you always get nervous playing on the road against a team that needs the game more than you do.
Not that my picks matter, but I think I have a slight lean towards the Colts here. I do love some of the smaller matchups in this noon start that could swing the game back to Dallas in this Super Bowl V rematch (a fact that I am sure is lost on every single player on the field on Sunday, and most readers, too).