Does the 49er d performance change what Dallas should do?

[BanditHiro]

the defense at beginning of the season was not that bad...the cowboys just got destroyed by injuries.

[cowboysooner]

Originally Posted by austin88

Silly as it sounds, I think is possible to overreact to those results. SF's defense was 2nd in scoring in both 2011 & 2012 (I think), and was obviously a huge part of them *getting* to the championship game both years. And their defense was effective in the second halves against Atlanta and Baltimore. I'm not sure I'd be ready to go all offense just based on that. Of course, any amount of playoff success looks pretty good to me as a Cowboy fan right now.

I agree with you that a one or two game sample is difficult to measure. Even a 16 game regular season is not a ton of data but there is a clear trend to these playoffs. LOSERS in the divisional round to Super Bowl scored 35, 31, 28, 28, 24, 13, and 31. Outside of New England, that is a lot of points to score and go home. The 5,000 yard passers are becoming as commonplace as 55+ home runs were in the steroid era in baseball. Last night, the WINNING team gave up 468 yards of offense.

I think the game may be changing and perhaps where you spend money and draft picks should change with it.

[FiveRings]

It's not like there's one template for being successful. Look at the Giants, they won 2 in 5 years by drafting nothing but D Ends. A system or theory is only bad when it's tampered with. Give any team time to grow and it will.

[ghst187]

it wasn't just the 40whiners it was the Ravens also....both teams are pretty marginal in the secondary (save Ed Reed), pretty mediocre in the WR dept, pretty barely above average at QB but very solid in the trenches on both sides of the ball and have decent, durable RBs.
This, IMO, contrasts us as I think we're pretty good in the secondary, very good in the WR, pretty good at QB, and horrible in the trenches with a glass RB. If you look at several of the last few SB winners you will find most of the teams were mediocre teams most of the season and got hot late then in the playoffs...but they all had a reliable OL, Running attack, and defense in the trenches. The only team that won it without these recently was probably New Orleans, who shouldn't have been there in the first place (Minnesota game). Both NYG teams, both Pitt teams, Green Bay ran it decently and played great D their year. Then if you look at the contenders this season in the playoffs...Seattle, Atlanta, Houston....all play pretty good D with solid running games and solid OL. That's why they're there at that time of year and sadly why we're not. The other thing is that I not totally sold that its a huge talent gap for units like our OL. Sure I think we could get better talent along the OL and DL and we should try really hard to do that. But I also believe that its as much unit cohesion and coaching as it is talent. Imagine where we'd be now had we traded up in '09 for Unger and used every other draft pick on OL or DL.....

[kelc]

Have to agree with winning in the trench's. You win there and everybody is better.

[Aven8]

Originally Posted by kelc

Have to agree with winning in the trench's. You win there and everybody is better.

I agree, but its amazing this crappy Oline roughed up the same Dline I saw last night earlier this season.

[Hoofbite]

The answer to the thread is, "no".

Dallas should not simply ignore defense because you still have to play defense.

Dallas is not a team that is built to outscore the opponent in a shootout every single week because they simply turn the ball over too much.

If you have absolutely nothing in terms of defense, you aren't winning shootouts if you turn the ball over as much as Dallas usually does.

If Dallas were to emulate anything the 49ers do, how about protecting the damn ball?

Dallas gets like 3-4 games per season where they don't turn it over. The 49ers had 7 games in 2011 and 7 games in 2012, each season being as much as Dallas' combined amount for those two seasons. You can't be turning the ball over that much.

Here are some totals for other teams in terms of the number of games without a turnover this season.

Patriots: 7
Ravens: 7
Falcons: 7

Those are the teams in the conference championship games. Each had 7 games over the course of the season and through the playoffs where they didn't turn the ball over.

Denver had 1 game this year and even Peyton looking as good as he ever has couldn't overcome it.

2011 and 2012 were above average in terms of the top teams and how many games they played without a turnover but I think Dallas really has to improve in this area.

I don't think it's a coincidence that a good number of the teams in the playoffs this year, and likely from years past, were some of the best in terms of protecting the ball.

[Clove]

I still think you have to have to pass rushers there's no getting past that.

[Future]

Originally Posted by cowboysooner

They have at worst 4 elite players in the front 7 and 3 better than average guys playing around them.

A. Smith has more sacks through 2 years than anyone in history. Justin Smith was DPOY in 2011. Willis and Bowman are All-Pros. If there is a better front 7 please point them out. That is as good as you can build in a salary cap era.

Their safeties are good players, but not great and their corners are just okay.

Their QB rating against was 91, 115 and 124. Can you build a good enough front 7 to disrupt playoff caliber passing offenses in today's NFL?

Does it require All-Pro level defenders at every level of defense? If so, you can't keep those guys on your roster if your qb's are making $20mm of a $120mm cap.

I'm not trying to argue about the greatness of the 49ers defense except to say on a relative basis they are at least among the 5 best and they had real trouble this post season.

Their safeties are not good against the pass. Great in the box, but not ball hawks. Neither Smith did anything in the playoffs and Ahmad Brooks is solid, nothing special. The 9ers defense overachieved last year because, the reality is, they only have 2 or 3 playmakers.

They are meant to be physical, play ball control, and protect a lead. When they give up a lead early, they aren't going to cause turnovers.

The whole notion that you shouldn't try to build a great defense b/c offenses are so good is almost ridiculous. Do people really think teams should just try to win a shootout every week?

[IrishAnto]

Originally Posted by UKCowboysFan

The best defensive teams do one of two things (or maybe both).

Create Turnovers, and give their offense more opportunities to score.

And that's the one thing the Cowboys defense has been poor at for a very long time.

I do hold out hope that Kiffin's defense will improve this particular aspect of the defense's game.

It needs to if we're to take the next step.

[CowboysYanksLakers]

When you smack a wanne be bully in the mouth they react differently...