- Joined
- Apr 7, 2013
- Messages
- 120,131
By Jon Machota 1h ago
As the 2020 season was coming to an end late last month, I attempted to find some positives from one of the Cowboys’ most disappointing seasons in recent memory.
The original plan was to publish our analysis of what went wrong for the team a few days later. But some other story ideas got in the way. So here we are, officially shutting the door on the 2020 season with 10 things that went wrong for the 6-10 Cowboys.
1. Injuries. Where should we start? It was a bad sign on the first day of training camp when La’el Collins and Sean Lee were already working off to the side on resistance cords. A hip issue eventually led to Collins getting surgery. Instead of the team’s starting right tackle providing an encore to his best season, he never played a single game. Left tackle Tyron Smith has battled various injuries each of the last five years. But in the previous four, he was still able to start 13 of the 16 regular-season games.
He missed 14 games in 2020 because of a neck injury that required surgery. Right guard Zack Martin entered the season having missed only two games in his first six seasons. He missed six in 2020 because of a concussion and then a calf injury. And then there’s tight end Blake Jarwin, who tore the ACL in his right knee in the season opener.
But the biggest hit came when Dak Prescott suffered a compound fracture and dislocated ankle in Week 5. Prescott had started every game during the previous four seasons. He missed 11 games in 2020.
Defensively, veteran interior lineman Gerald McCoy was expected to have a significant role in his first year with the Cowboys. However, his season ended in training camp when he ruptured his right quadriceps tendon. Linebacker Leighton Vander Esch missed four games with a broken collarbone and then the final two games with a high ankle sprain. Defensive tackle Trysten Hill started five games before a torn ACL in his right knee ended his season in Week 5.
The Cowboys had only seven of their 22 expected Week 1 starters play in all 16 games: WR Amari Cooper, WR Michael Gallup, WR CeeDee Lamb, LG Connor Williams, DE DeMarcus Lawrence, DE Aldon Smith and LB Jaylon Smith.
2. Coaching concerns. It wasn’t a great first season for Mike McCarthy. The high number of key injuries and navigating through the limited time with players because of the COVID-19 pandemic made his job difficult. There’s no question teams with new coaching staffs were at a disadvantage. But what was on display through 16 games didn’t exactly look like a significant upgrade from the previous staff. McCarthy was brought in to replace Jason Garrett because Garrett couldn’t get the Cowboys beyond the divisional round of the playoffs. McCarthy’s resume shows he’s more than capable of getting that done. But resume aside, if studying only 2020, there wasn’t much there to guarantee greater playoff success is on the horizon. Perhaps the most alarming concern is that the coaching staff is already making significant changes after only one season.
“We have a lot of work to do, and that’s starting with me,” McCarthy said last week. “It doesn’t look the way I want it to look, but I think we’re definitely heading in the right direction. I think we got as far as we could as far as our operation and getting a team ready to prepare and doing the things that you need to do each and every year. But I definitely know we can be better in some areas, and that’s really where my focus is.”
3. Defense never adapted. There was a lot of talk in the offseason about how the new coaching staff was committed to getting the best players and then fitting the scheme to the personnel. It especially sounded great because it was different from what the Cowboys had been doing, adding players that fit their scheme. It worked out so poorly in defensive coordinator Mike Nolan’s first season that he has already been replaced by Dan Quinn, whose background is much more similar to the previous defensive coordinator, Rod Marinelli.
The biggest issues occurred in the front seven as the defense went from a base 4-3 to a more multiple scheme with 3-4 looks. The Cowboys’ best defensive player, DeMarcus Lawrence, went from rushing the passer with his hand on the ground — his strength — to standing up more and rushing as a 3-4 outside linebacker. While that was a better fit for Aldon Smith, the other starting edge rusher, Lawrence wasn’t as effective until Nolan was forced to make changes.
The problems up front led to the Cowboys having the league’s second-worst run defense, allowing 158.8 rushing yards per game. In the previous four seasons, that average never went beyond 104 yards per game.
4. Effort issues. Implementing a new defense during a pandemic was clearly a mistake. The players never fully bought in, ultimately leading to effort issues, particularly late in losses to Washington twice and at Baltimore. Things got so bad that, following the 34-17 loss to the Ravens in Week 13, McCarthy addressed the team about them.
“When your head coach gets up and addresses the team like that, it really presents an opportunity for each individual, including myself, just all of us to just look in the mirror,” Jaylon Smith said at the time. “Look in the mirror, understand what you’re putting out on tape and hold ourselves accountable.
“The standard has to be effort to the ball, sprinting, making sure that you’re protecting your brother. Mike McCarthy as the head man, we got to listen to what he’s saying. We got to process it, we got to understand exactly what he’s talking about. And then from there, we got to go forward.
“It’s non-negotiable. … It’s a big reason why we are where we are.”
5. Linebacker struggles. Entering the season, this looked like one of the strongest positions on the roster. Today, it looks like one of the weakest. Smith set a career-high in tackles, but those statistics don’t tell the whole story. It was much more common for those tackles to come 10 yards down the field than near the line of scrimmage. Smith showed the potential to be an elite playmaking linebacker a couple of years ago, but that hasn’t been nearly as common since. He struggles to get off blocks in the running game and continues to have issues defending in the passing game. Vander Esch has shown upside when healthy, but he has missed too many games the last two seasons because of various injuries.
“I think toward the end of the season we started making the strides that we wanted to make and we started to build off that and create an identity for ourselves,” Vander Esch said. “But at the end of the day, we’ve got a lot of things we’ve got to clean up, still. I know for myself, I don’t think we’re back where we want to be, but it’s constant improvement, it’s a constant grind. I know I’m already looking forward to this coming season, and I’m just looking forward to training and getting better individually.
“And I think a lot of guys are in the same position. That’s what we need. We need everybody focused, and we need everybody working as hard as they possibly can. Who knows what this offseason is going to look like moving forward being like last year, but we’ve got to get things right. I’m just looking forward to keep improving and keep working my hardest. We’ve got to have everybody pulling along.”
6. An average running game. The Cowboys haven’t significantly invested in the offensive line and running back positions to just be average in this area. Injuries to the offensive line certainly were a factor. But there were too many games when Ezekiel Elliott didn’t look like the explosive back he once was while winning rushing titles in 2016 and 2018. The Cowboys averaged only 112 rushing yards per game and 4.2 yards per carry. In 2019, they averaged 135 yards per game and 4.8 yards per carry.
Elliott had several career-lows in 2020, averaging only 4.0 yards per carry and finishing with 979 rushing yards in 15 games. He managed only three runs of 20 or more yards. His three best games all came after he didn’t play the week before. He was excellent in the season opener, rushing for 96 yards and scoring two touchdowns.
Following the Cowboys’ bye week, Elliott rushed for 103 yards and caught a touchdown pass against the Vikings. After missing the 49ers game because of a calf injury, he rushed for a season-high 105 yards against the Eagles in Week 15.
7. Free agency mistakes. There were some additions that worked out well. They got 16 starts out of Aldon Smith, which no one could have expected entering the season. Signing Andy Dalton to a one-year deal was an excellent move as well, especially considering Prescott’s season-ending injury. Kicker Greg Zuerlein proved to be a good signing, too.
But they missed in too many spots on defense. Defensive linemen Everson Griffen and Dontari Poe didn’t make much of an impact. Both were gone by the end of October. McCoy’s injury prevented him from ever playing in a game. Safety Ha Ha Clinton-Dix was cut before the season started. Cornerback Daryl Worley started four games but was cut in late October.
The Cowboys are not expected to be much of a player in free agency this offseason, but they will again need to find some help on defense. It will have to be more impactful than last year’s group.
8. Poor showing against the division. Dallas finished 2-4 against an awful NFC East. That’s their worst division record since 2011. Over the three previous seasons, the Cowboys went 15-3 in NFC East games.
McCarthy had a lot of success against his NFC North rivals while in Green Bay, going a combined 54-22-2, including playoffs, against the Bears, Vikings and Lions. His final two seasons coaching the Packers were the only two he finished with a losing record against the division. It’s difficult to see his time in Dallas lasting very long if that NFC East record doesn’t improve. After all, it’s not like there’s a dominant team among the group.
“The division games are the most important games,” McCarthy said in October before the Cowboys played their first division game. “There’s a very clear statistic based on the number of wins in your division, the win percentage of making the playoffs goes up with every win. So, really, you’ve got to be north of four from a pure numbers standpoint to think you’re going to be in the hunt for the tournament. I think we all clearly understand that. You obviously play these games twice a year. We spend as much time as we possibly can on division games. … This is of high importance to me. (They’re) the most important games of the year.”
9. Turnovers. Only four teams gave the ball away more than the Cowboys’ offense in 2020. Washington, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Denver were the only teams with more turnovers than Dallas’ 26. The biggest concern is that 11 happened in the first five games, when Prescott was still healthy. The biggest positive is that the number decreased as the season went along. There were only six in the final seven games.
Elliott struggled taking care of the ball early in the season, coughing it up five times in the first six games. He only fumbled once in his final nine games
“I think it’s a lot of a mental thing,” Elliott said. “I think it’s something I have to make sure that I’m on top of day in and day out. If I handle it that way, then I’ll be good. Just locking in, focusing, practicing. Just repetition of good ball security.”
10. Red zone deficiency. The red zone was an issue on offense, which probably can be somewhat connected to the fact that the Cowboys started four different quarterbacks in 2020.
Dallas scored touchdowns on only 50 percent of its trips inside the red zone. The Bengals, Giants and Jets were the only teams with lower percentages in that area. For fontext, the Cowboys converted 57 percent in 2019, 52 percent in 2018, 60 percent in 2017 and 65.5 percent in 2016, which was fifth-best in the NFL. Their best season over the last decade in that area came in 2013, when they scored touchdowns 69 percent of the time they reached the red zone.
“I think obviously, execution comes at a premium when you’re down there,” Zack Martin said. “So, really, it comes down to that. I always think offenses — especially the offensive line — but offenses are graded on how they do in those critical situations and situations where the entire stadium knows what’s going to happen. It’s going to be run/pass or whatever it may be, and those are what offenses are judged on. So I think we should make plays in those critical situations that really win and lose games.”
