Sturm's Decoding Linehan - 2016 Wrap-up And Looking At Romo Tape!

Cotton

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By Bob Sturm, Special contributor

In a game where literally nothing else mattered, we thank the football gods for offering us one 6-play drive of Tony Romo to offer you this morning - because any and all other things in that game will be summarily dismissed.

The game happened. Stats were accumulated. In the words of Bob Knight, "Let's move on to something else, if in fact there is something else."

Well, there is coach.

Tony Romo played his first (sort of) meaningful football since Thanksgiving 2015. As I said yesterday, I don't really see the benefit of it all, beyond the idea of making everyone feel warm and fuzzy to see just six plays.

Zero plays would make sense if you felt like he was done here and you don't want to hurt value by playing him.

Twenty to thirty plays make sense if you wanted to sharpen him up against live-action (and potential contact) for either A) the possibility of playing in the post-season or B) enhancing his trade value by showing the league what he looks like.

But, six? That didn't make much sense.

Six, to me, felt like the dipping of a toe into the water and then suggesting that we just got our toe wet, so let's not risk an entire foot for fear of drowning.

I could be wrong, but I think when Tiger Woods is trying to get back into tournament form after a long layoff, he will play 2-dozen rounds of golf (to get warm), not 1 hole. But, either way, I will take what we got, because nothing else was very interesting.

So, let's look at that drive and see what we can see from ol' #9:



Snap #1 - Shotgun 11, Eagles zone it up, and Romo sees a shot on the right sideline to Terrance Williams without any safeties bothering him, so he fires it down the field about 45-47 yards and overthrows his man a bit. But, that felt like a show of intent and a message that he isn't out here to check it down.



After a TFL from the running game, here is a 3rd and 14. He had the free dump down to his RB out on the left flat, but you could tell Tony wasn't interested in a 3-and-out here. Trips the right with Witten staying in and releasing. Beasley heads right down the middle to occupy everyone in the middle of the zone and that allows Williams to get inside leverage on the corner and dig to the middle at the chains. The danger of this route against a zone is 58-Hicks undercutting the route (and you can see he is there if he sees it), but Romo puts good zip on the ball and makes this throw look pretty easy.



From the end zone camera, you can see Romo with some expert QB-ing here by using his eyes against a zone. That may seem basic, but obviously, it requires you to know where everyone is going on their routes, rather than have to see it with your eyes. Then, at the last second, as Williams gets to the top of his stem and breaks in, you head back to him and fire a strike. Well done.



After a big McFadden run, the Cowboys are now on the Eagles side of the field with a 1st and 10. Here, the Eagles remain pretty vanilla in their zone and drop 7 so, Romo takes the easy check down. I have to confess, I was wondering when Jim Schwartz was going to bring pressure. He never did. Which is something any of us who fear for the fragility of this matter wanted to see and relax about when he takes a hit or two. It was almost like the Eagles were not interested in testing Romo, either.

Good elusiveness from McFadden to shake Hicks.



Eagles finally change up to some Cover-1 Rat and that is where Romo is going to see some tasty man-coverage options where Dez Bryant can try 22-Nolan Carroll on for size. Again, Romo using his technique to square his shoulders to right to sell the idea of the comeback to Beasley, which is done to hold the center fielder and move him towards the offensive right. The moment the safety takes a step in the wrong direction, the ball is off to Dez. Carroll is lost and panics, which offers a defensive pass interference flag down to the 3. How many times have we seen this?



For years, the Eagles have wanted to play defense like the Vikings do, which is to just trust that your corners are able to hold up in man coverage. And for years, the corners have not been good enough to repay that trust with shutdown ability (regardless of paycheck investment).

So, you can see above, the Eagles are sure this is a zone run - and it probably is. The RPO is something we have seen the Cowboys use all season when they see something they like on the edge - especially down here. So, it is 22-Carroll versus 83-Williams and this is a beautiful pump-and-go for a touchdown that made everyone feel like it was 2014 again.



This view doesn't offer much insight on Williams, but you can see Romo's poise and confidence that this is there and he is ready to take advantage.

What are you going to say about that drive? It looked great. I wanted to see more and I wanted to see the Eagles do something a bit more testing, but all in all, it was an enjoyable distraction to a bland game.

Ok, in lieu of breaking down Week 17, let's look at some 2016 (in-full) results:

SEASON-LONG DATA BOX



Now, there are two ways to look at the above chart and the way you choose will allow you to know your position on the ol' half-full/half-empty imbroglio of life. You can either say those are amazing stats if you consider the circumstances and if you can finish in the Top 10 in just about every major offensive category with a rookie QB, you are in for a bright future. OR, you can say, I bet they would have been top 5 in all of those if we looked at them the day after Thanksgiving and what happened in December?

Let's put it this way - it was quite an offensive season.

DAK PRESCOTT THROW CHART - FULL SEASON



My main man, John Daigle, made this beauty yesterday. It is the full-season throw chart for Dak Prescott. Every last throw is here. It is clear that his best attribute is knowing where to throw the ball to increase your chances at good and decrease your chances at bad things. This is a positive for sure. Look how seldom he messed with deep safeties. I would love to run a similar chart for the NFL's interceptions and I bet you would see one big yellow circle in the middle of the field between 15-25 yards.

Pretty even distribution from left to right and his depth of throw ranks right there with the best QBs in the league (and more importantly to many, it seems, Tony Romo's 2014 masterpiece) - despite the silly narratives that try to say otherwise.

PERSONNEL GROUPINGS - FULL SEASON



There is a lot to look at above, but the simple truth is that the Cowboys offense is back to being a powerful machine in 2016. In 11 and 12 personnel, they would declare run and run the ball. In shotgun 11, they would spread you out and pick you apart and move the ball. They would fall about 100 yards short of 2014's production (we imagine that final game was the difference there) and otherwise sparkled all year with their balance and might.

They never fully established the multiple TE situation after losing Geoff Swaim and we aren't convinced they have much at FB, but in 11-personnel, there are very few teams you would rather have than this one.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

2016 was all very impressive across the board for this group.

Next week, we prepare for the march. The pressure will increase along with the anxiety and the stakes will raise considerably.

Until then, enjoy the bye week (not too much) and tomorrow we wrap up the defense.
 
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