Sturm: The Morning After - Cowboys surge continues as they rout Eagles, put NFC East in play

dpf1123

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Cowboys surge continues as they rout Eagles, put NFC East in play: Morning After


By Bob Sturm

The thing I will always love most about sports is on full display yet again. Just when you think you have something figured out, the script flips and gets compelling again.
We certainly focus on when we think a narrative is driving to a dream ending and then it falls and shatters on the floor. Do we also note, however, that just as often, when we suggest an NFL season is over before Halloween, occasionally the “pointless” and the “play out the string” mentality reverses course, leading us to redeemable components in the rubble?

As you certainly know if you read my work, you know that I pronounced this season unworthy of your full attention after that ridiculous Tuesday night in Baltimore not so long ago. But if you did so, you have ignored some entertaining football against some old friends in San Francisco and Philadelphia these last two weekends. And that would be a shame.

Because during these games, you are starting to see growth that could lead somewhere in 2021. More importantly, you are seeing this team salvage something in 2020. The next time they play — noon on Sunday at Metlife Field in East Rutherford, New Jersey — their season will hang in the balance, as they have a chance to be NFC East champions with a little help from Washington. And that is just as ridiculous as it sounds.

Speaking of ridiculous, here is the account of another ridiculous game played at AT&T Stadium in 2020. The Eagles put together a long and demoralizing drive to start the game that took more plays (11), more time (6:00) and more first downs (seven) than any other drive they would run the entire day. It even included a disallowed trucking by young Jalen Hurts over Jourdan Lewis at the goal-line because Hurts stepped out of bounds. But on the next play, a zone-read put Miles Sanders in the end zone for a touchdown.

The drive was immediately awesome and gave a feeling of impending doom that those Eagles were about to stick it to Dallas around the holidays yet again. I’m not sure how many times it has happened in the last two decades, but it almost feels like a holiday tradition — one no Cowboys fan likes. Dallas answered with a decent drive that hit the skids in the red zone with a sack and a miss to Tony Pollard, so they settled for a first-drive field goal.

The Eagles’ second drive was their longest (81 yards) and their shortest (one play) of the day. It was an attack on young safety Donovan Wilson in center field, as the Cowboys played a Cover 3, and the key here is for the deep safety to not let the deep threat go. Unfortunately, as the Eagles were in max-protection to try a play-action deep shot, the Cowboys had one safety (Darian Thompson) up to deal with the run. So one corner (Diggs) is running with the tight end Zach Ertz to his side, and the other corner (Awuzie) is needing help on the over-route as Cover 3 has the corners in the usual outside leverage. Wilson does not recognize that and heads downhill to Ertz, as noted Cowboys killer DeSean Jackson is blowing right past him over the star and with half the field to run under Hurts throw. The throw leads him well, and by the time he stops running with his still-lightning wheels, he is in the end zone for an 81-yard strike that puts the Eagles up 14-3.

DeSean Jackson is an absurd talent. He may only have one trick in his bag these days, but it is a great one. I have always been fascinated by his career and, I suppose, by his ability to always torture the Cowboys. Consider this: In 2010, Michael Vick threw him a 91-yard touchdown pass in this exact same stadium. I have no idea what the longest length of time between a guy scoring 80-yard touchdowns must be, but 2010 to 2020 is a lifetime in the NFL and much longer than most careers. For DeSean Jackson to do that against the same team in the same stadium is crazy. Add in the rookie season 60-yard catch that he dropped before the goal-line as part of his ill-fated celebration and the 67-yarder in 2016 from Kirk Cousins on Thanksgiving for Washington, and you could definitely create a highlight film of “DeSean Jackson at Dallas” moments that would surpass most players’. The Cowboys defenders change, but Jackson can still get behind them for huge haymakers.

Here is where it gets pretty silly. Dallas is down 14-3 heading into the second quarter, which is a double-digit deficit and generally a death sentence to try to win the game. The rest of the NFL is 2-21 this year when trailing by 11 or more after 15 minutes. Dallas? Well, the Cowboys are now 3-0! They pulled off this trick against Atlanta (down 20) and the Giants (down 11) and here against the Eagles (down 11). Please explain to me how the entire sport can be 2-21 while a 6-9 team has bucked that trend and gone 3-0 against those odds and circumstances. Because I have no answers except that this unpredictability makes football fun for me.

From there, the Cowboys kept their composure quite well and did not deviate from their belief that the Eagles defense was a shell of itself. If there is an advantage to be gained, it must be on the perimeter of the field. The irony here, of course, is that during the first meeting between these hated rivals back on November 1st (Week 8), the Cowboys could not use their receivers for much of anything because their quarterback that night, rookie Ben DiNucci, was having a hard time doing anything in an actual game. I hesitate to suggest he will never be prepared for that challenge, as the circumstances that had him leading the Cowboys under center that night were certainly much more than a man can be expected to handle in his first NFL season with no real preparation. Thus, the Cowboys had 12 receptions to their wide receivers, but almost none of them traveled more than five yards down the field and none went for a gain of more than 14 yards total. They had great talent, but no way to use it.
This was absolutely a much different story, as the Cowboy aerial attack yesterday was swift and decisive. Not only did all three of Amari Cooper, CeeDee Lamb and Michael Gallup amass 15-yard receptions; they all three had 50-yard receptions. They scored four touchdowns and torched the Eagles secondary no matter who was out there or where they lined up. Eagles defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz again had no feel for what to do next, so like an addicted gambler in a casino, he kept trying to double-down to chase his losses and would make the hole even deeper with another over-aggressive blitz that Andy Dalton easily decoded and punished.



We have no idea what Dalton’s market in a few months’ time when he attempts to find a new starting gig in this league, but there can be no question that he has made a stark difference since his return in Week 11. The Cowboys have been able to average nearly 29 points per game in their last six games and 36 points per game in their last three wins, putting them in position to play somewhat meaningful football until the very end of their season. It has not been pretty along the way, but Dallas showing some signs of life in Minnesota back on November 22nd and to maintain a lot of positivity through Christmas is a small mission accomplished amidst lots of overall failure to the dreams of last summer.

The Cowboys flipped a 14-3 deficit with five consecutive scoring drives, taking a 30-17 lead midway through the third quarter. Even more impressive, all five of those drives were not aided by any sort of short field from a takeaway and thus deceiving. These were all big-boy drives where Dallas just found a matchup they liked and attacked. Schwartz and his defense were clueless once Fletcher Cox exited with a stinger, and the rout was on. During those five drives, they rolled up 368 total yards at 9.4 yards per play. You will not see an offensive show with that much destruction anytime soon, as Dallas looked like they were lined up against a community college. It was a basic concept: just throw it to a much more talented player than the one trying to cover him.

At that point, the Dallas defense also started causing young Hurts problems that he will need to sort through as a young QB with a lot on his plate. The Eagles took him in the second round, which clearly foreshadowed the reality that Carson Wentz was on well-compensated-but-thin ice. And as the season has gone on, there is certainly no question that Hurts has given them a massive spark and put a little fire back in the belly of the Eagles organization.

As we knew from studying him in college, he doesn’t see the field very well. If you can prevent him from running around and generating chaos, he has a hard time delivering the football against sound defense. And as the score started tilting away from his favor, we gained clarity: The Cowboys were rushing the passer but trying to corral him and not let him out of the pocket. When that happens, the questions are louder than his answers, and he runs into many of the same roadblocks we saw at the college level. The rosters here, however, do not suggest he always will enjoy a talent advantage. In other words, Hurts is a nice prospect, but I suspect the Eagles might end up back at the QB drawing board once the league decides to force Hurts into what he does poorly. And that is also why we should expect Ron Rivera to choke off most of his ideas next Sunday night with a much better defensive roster than Dallas has.

The Eagles’ last three drives did end in turnovers, as Anthony Brown, Randy Gregory and Trevon Diggs all had takeaways. But unlike the last few weeks, they were more the result of the win and not the pure cause of it. Dallas won this game due to key tactical matchups on both sides of the ball, despite having major faults exposed again along the way.

The Cowboys and Eagles are shells of themselves this season and are certainly well below their lines of acceptable play and accomplishment. It has caused Doug Pederson and Mike McCarthy to both lose some credibility points in their locales despite both having held up the Lombardi Trophy.
It is a tough league, and people have short memories. It all comes with the dinner. Unlike last year in Week 16, this time Pederson was eliminated from a meaningful Week 17. That was the death blow to Jason Garrett’s administration. We don’t know if the same will happen to Pederson.

What we do know is this: Like the 2006 Green Bay Packers, the first year of Mike McCarthy has gained steam down the stretch. That year, Green Bay did not play in the postseason, but a strong finish did appear to lend credibility to his rebuild of the roster and belief in his locker room that set quite a table for 2007-2016, a decade that would yield a 106-53-1 regular-season record, 10 playoff wins and six divisional titles. The Packers won a Super Bowl and four NFC Championship Games.

I can make no promises that this will be that — or even close. But perhaps the stretch run has allowed him a few minutes to get back to work on his team as opposed to hearing what a horrible hire the Cowboys made from everyone out in TV land.

And if they somehow win a division in a year when everything went wrong?

All the better.
 

ravidubey

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If we go to the playoffs, so be it. Just so long as we're legit building something with the young players.

In this draft 11 vs 19 might not be as big a change in this upcoming draft as it would normally be.
 

p1_

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What we do know is this: Like the 2006 Green Bay Packers, the first year of Mike McCarthy has gained steam down the stretch. That year, Green Bay did not play in the postseason, but a strong finish did appear to lend credibility to his rebuild of the roster and belief in his locker room that set quite a table for 2007-2016, a decade that would yield a 106-53-1 regular-season record, 10 playoff wins and six divisional titles. The Packers won a Super Bowl and (played in) four NFC Championship Games.
that right there is quite the resume.
 

Genghis Khan

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that right there is quite the resume.
It really is. Even when you consider he had an all timer in Rodgers for much of it. It's why we need to be patient and give him a bit more time to get things going. The track record suggests it might be worth it.
 

lostxn

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If we go to the playoffs, so be it. Just so long as we're legit building something with the young players.

In this draft 11 vs 19 might not be as big a change in this upcoming draft as it would normally be.
I think in the longterm we're better off with the draft picks but this is important for McCarthy. Also it's just more fun to watch. But I have no illusions that it means much about the quality of football team this is.
 

Cowboysrock55

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I think in the longterm we're better off with the draft picks but this is important for McCarthy. Also it's just more fun to watch. But I have no illusions that it means much about the quality of football team this is.
Yeah it's definitely more enjoyable to watch.
 

ravidubey

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Yeah it's definitely more enjoyable to watch.
The playoffs are what it’s all about. We’re not getting a top three or even a top five pick no matter what happens, so why not?

Our wideouts have certainly earned the opportunity, and the OL has improved in spite of everything. Getting that experience is huge for our young guys.

The one player I can’t stand seeing in the postseason is Jaylon Smith, but that’s really it. Poe is gone, and everyone else is working hard.

The biggest barrier for Dallas getting to the postseason is the pathetic Eagles OL facing the NFLs best front with nothing to play for.
 
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