Colin Cowherd: The Dallas Cowboys will win the NFC East

Cujo

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Colin has been hitting the crackpipe. Unless Philly suffers a rash of injuries (more than last year, obviously) it is their's to lose.
 

Cowboysrock55

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Colin has been hitting the crackpipe. Unless Philly suffers a rash of injuries (more than last year, obviously) it is their's to lose.
To be fair no one has repeated as NFC East champs. I think there is now a chance the Eagles sort of get figured out after having a new coach. I wouldn't be surprised to see them take a step back. Plus I think they got really complacent in the draft taking backup TEs and such. Then they try to improve by adding a very questionable personality at DE who is in legal trouble. So we will see. I'm not predicting an Eagles fall from grace but it wouldn't surprise me if they came back to earth.

Plus their real star QB is coming back from a bad injury.
 

Couchcoach

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Zeke will be back without distractions, Dak will probably mature, O line improved with Williams, receiving game improved, I'd say overall our defense is better. IMO we're better than last year.
But still not on Philly's level. Play and coaching has to step up or we're gonna struggle in the post season. I think we make the playoffs.
 

lostxn

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To be fair no one has repeated as NFC East champs. I think there is now a chance the Eagles sort of get figured out after having a new coach. I wouldn't be surprised to see them take a step back. Plus I think they got really complacent in the draft taking backup TEs and such. Then they try to improve by adding a very questionable personality at DE who is in legal trouble. So we will see. I'm not predicting an Eagles fall from grace but it wouldn't surprise me if they came back to earth.

Plus their real star QB is coming back from a bad injury.
Their QB had an ACL. He should be fine. He's not a running QB after all. As for draft complacency, they are still paying for moving up to draft Wentz (in front of us, fuckers).

At some point, though, our defense should pass theirs. We have more talent on defense at this point. The question is whether we can pull it together and stay healthy.
 

Cowboysrock55

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Their QB had an ACL. He should be fine. He's not a running QB after all. As for draft complacency, they are still paying for moving up to draft Wentz (in front of us, fuckers).

At some point, though, our defense should pass theirs. We have more talent on defense at this point. The question is whether we can pull it together and stay healthy.
Wentz is actually really athletic. Plus that stuff can throw a QBs accuracy off.
 

lostxn

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Wentz is actually really athletic. Plus that stuff can throw a QBs accuracy off.
Well hopefully he will suck. I did an analysis of our roster vs the Eagles. They're still better by a fair margin. They whip our talent on WR (unless Gallop comes in and becomes a Pro Bowler), TE (unless Gathers becomes the second coming of Antonio Gates), safety, and the defensive line. We have them on special teams, OL (though not by much) and RB (not by much). We should end up with significantly better LBers but that's a projection as well. This is not to mention the advantage they have at the most important position - QB and, of course, coaching.

Damn, when you really look at it on paper it's a little depressing. However, predicting NFL seasons is pretty much pure speculation. So we'll see...

 

Genghis Khan

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Also, depth is a big big deal and it's not accounted for here.

The biggest difference between our teams last year was we lost important players and collapsed. They lost important players and won the super bowl.
 

Genghis Khan

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Smith is not their WR3 any more, it's Mike Wallace.

One of their corners will probably be Sidney Jones.

Also, McLeod is better than Heath, Hicks is better than Vander Esch, Bradham is better than Smith, Bennett is probably better than Crawford, Kendricks I don't think is particularly good.
 

lostxn

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Smith is not their WR3 any more, it's Mike Wallace.

One of their corners will probably be Sidney Jones.

Also, McLeod is better than Heath, Hicks is better than Vander Esch, Bradham is better than Smith, Bennett is probably better than Crawford, Kendricks I don't think is particularly good.
I forgot about Mike Wallace.

A lot of the rest of the stuff is arguable. McLeod doesn't impress me and Heath actually had a pretty good second half of the season to end up as probably an average safety. Vander Esch will be better than Hicks IMHO. Maybe not week 1 but certainly by week 16. Isn't Hicks coming off an Achilles anyway?

I still hold out hope that Smith will live up to his pre-injury draft stock. He's running without a brace so its certainly possible. Bennett is better than Crawford but we actually have a ton of depth at DE so I made it a push to reflect that. Also, Bennett should be suspended if Gooddell is even close to even-handed to handing out punishment. The guy is charged with injuring an elderly paraplegic. We'll see how that goes...
 

Cowboysrock55

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Graham has put up better numbers over the last 3 years. Graham was second team all pro in 2016.
Brandon Graham's best career year was last year with 9.5 sacks.

DLaw had 14.5 sacks.

But regardless there is a lot of unknowns with Dallas compared to Philly. I mean when Irving's heads on right he is one of the best DT's in the NFL. Of course last year that was only about half a season. Xavier Woods is a red on that chart. But from what I saw last year he is going to be our best safety. Way better than Jeff Heath for example.

The position by position analysis is fun but it's not ever as cut and dry as people want to make it. Smith is better than Peters. Martin is way better than Brooks. But the chart lists them as pushes which is crazy.

I think our talent is actually fairly close to them. The big difference is coaching. Although I know a few on here think Wentz is in a different stratosphere than Dak. I don't agree but last year Wentz was better than Dak. As rookies Dak was better than Wentz. We will see what happens next season.
 

Genghis Khan

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I actually didn't love what I saw from Wentz so far, last season included. I know a lot of people would disagree vehemently with that statement, but the fact that Foles came in and had very little drop off I believe vindicates me.

You can argue that their coaching staff was scheming and hiding Foles' weaknesses, but that's my point. They were doing the same with wentz (though probably not to the same degree).
 

1bigfan13

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I think our talent is actually fairly close to them. The big difference is coaching. Although I know a few on here think Wentz is in a different stratosphere than Dak. I don't agree but last year Wentz was better than Dak. As rookies Dak was better than Wentz. We will see what happens next season.
That's usually the case in Dallas over the past decade. Our talent is just as good as most of the teams making trips to conference title games and Super Bowls. But coaching continues to hold us back. I think that'll continue to be the case going forward as long as Jerry Jones keeps settling on coaches like Garrett.
 

1bigfan13

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I actually didn't love what I saw from Wentz so far, last season included. I know a lot of people would disagree vehemently with that statement, but the fact that Foles came in and had very little drop off I believe vindicates me.

You can argue that their coaching staff was scheming and hiding Foles' weaknesses, but that's my point. They were doing the same with wentz (though probably not to the same degree).
I gotta disagree. Wentz was legitimately in the MVP conversation before his injury. Foles came in and was very shaky and inconsistent. He finally started playing well once the playoffs started. But prior to that, everyone assumed the Eagles would be 1 and done based on how Foles had been playing heading into the postseason.
 

lostxn

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Xavier Woods is a red on that chart. But from what I saw last year he is going to be our best safety. Way better than Jeff Heath for example.
He's a 6th round pick who hasn't played the position yet I don't believe. They've only played him as a nickel corner. So I put him as red for worse than league average which I think is a fair place for him to start at the beginning of the season. Hell, we've been trying hard to upgrade him (Earl Thomas, trade up for T. Moore).

The position by position analysis is fun but it's not ever as cut and dry as people want to make it. Smith is better than Peters. Martin is way better than Brooks. But the chart lists them as pushes which is crazy.
Smith is better than Peters but they're both Pro Bowl level players. Martin is better than Brooks but they're both Pro Bowlers. That's why they ended up being a push. Basically it's green for star (pro bowl caliber), yellow for above average, no shade for average, red for below average. I probably should have more below average players on both teams but whatever. I spent 10 minutes on it. It ain't gonna be perfect.
 
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