Poll: BIGGEST reason our defense was so bad in 2025

[Kwyn]

Having chefs that cant cook is one thing and thats BAD

Having an executive chef that wont put them at a different station or switch up his menu to see what he can get out of what he has is a failure

Having a Michelin rated chef prepare a meal with peanut butter and jelly and no bread will give you a nicely arranged plate of peanut butter and jelly

 

[Wildcat711]

I picked Flus.. but to be honest I could have ticked all the boxes.

 

[tomokawan]

Eberflus. He got talent in and they got worse. No improvement at all.

 

[Mark]

All contributory factors, for sure. Ranked?

1. Defensive Coordinator Matt Eberflus. Other (former) NFL coaches and commentators were calling out the guy for defensive plays and schemes frequently inappropriate (baffling, even). The "Dumbsday Defense." Enough said.

2. Lack of continuity with 4 DCs in 5 years. Even with the fluidity of today's rosters, it's a huge "ask" for any squad to adopt and learn a new defensive philosophy and scheme every year.

3. Lack of defensive talent. Injuries and JAGs are a fact of life for every team. You deal with it. And...at least on paper...was the talent really "last-in-the-League" bad?

4. Trade of Micah Parsons. Is anyone truly convinced that the ex-Dallas podcaster and malcontent would have significantly revved-up this year's model?

 

[ShiningStar]

all of those are Nos and the real answer left off. Shocking.


Matt E? No, simply put he didnt hide his scheme, he didnt hide his intent, Jerry hired him knowing everything that would take place. Jerry confidently and knowingly ruined the season by wasting time in the off season. i called that one early.

Lack of defensive talent? yes but mostly no, yes to the scheme, no to the single talent, they only operated well under Dan Quinn and slowly under Zimmer. Is the talent great? no, but its on the field because 1 coaches have no option 2 Jerry screws up a draft. Lets stop kidding ourselves.

Lack of chemistry with DC? also no, players are paid, they do the job, seek the ball and stop it or get it. Most schemes are dying or changing as players have gotten faster and talent has dropped some what on both sides. We have huge men playing at lines. heck most players dont make a full season.

Trade of Micah? also no, we pay Micah and lose, or dont pay Micah and lose. which happened? Micah is not the player to get us over the hump nor was he the player that got GB over the hump, the ONLY player. GB wanted it more than we did. This is not a debate anymore, anyone debating it would debate 2 plus 2 is 4.

Jerry screwed up the off season, he took nothing serious and BS did the best he could but anyone with a brain cell knew the season was trashed because we had some new coaches and lets face it, this team needs a new injection.

 

[PA Cowboy Fan]

It was all of the above. Picked lack of talent though.

 

[Starforever]

Lack of talent both covers coach and players.

 

[Chasing6]

2025 gave us the most points ever surrendered in a Cowboys season. So…In your opinion, what was the BIGGEST reason our defense was so bad in 2025?

Vote and tell us your reasoning.

I picked a lack of talent. This was the least talented defensive roster I’ve seen in a long time. (Getting Q Williams is a step forward) Eberflus was awful and having 4 DCs in 5 years doesn’t help. But it’s hard for even good coaching to work miracles without some talent.

Timing of the Trade with Parsons.

 

[kskboys]

Ok you cant really judge talent when you are in wrong/bad scheme, with bad DC.
The trade of Parsons cant count, because 31 teams dont have him either and they do ok.
Lack of continuity just means we have had bad dc's after quinn.

And really quinn had parsons young and feisty to help him look good, and some of the other players like diggs and bland were much better then.

You need a good DC's to start with, and this darante jones, if he looks at the players he has then designs the best defense for them, he may be the best candidate. That would be very flexible.
Once they get a top DC let them help pick the new def talent brought in or drafted.

And you can't judge a DC w/ an extreme lack of talent. Goes both ways.

 

[oldcorvetteguy]

2025 gave us the most points ever surrendered in a Cowboys season. So…In your opinion, what was the BIGGEST reason our defense was so bad in 2025?

Vote and tell us your reasoning.

I picked a lack of talent. This was the least talented defensive roster I’ve seen in a long time. (Getting Q Williams is a step forward) Eberflus was awful and having 4 DCs in 5 years doesn’t help. But it’s hard for even good coaching to work miracles without some talent.

It looked like there wasn't any coaching. Everybody was on their own.

 

[stiletto]

Coach. He couldn't even get decent play out of his pet cats. Known good/decent players became worse players. Nothing worked at all. Very unusual. Never thought I'd see worse than Mike Nolan but here we are.

Bad talent is #2 but they had guys like Kenny Clark. QW, Osa looking like trash. That has to be scheme and general design of the D to me for EVERYBODY to look like hot garbage.

 

[plymkr]

I went with Eberflus but I will say every other option was a pretty close second. My vote for Eberflus is based on 2 things.

1. I live south of Chicago so I am entrenched in Bears country and the biggest complaint of Eberflus by every Bears fan I interacted with the last couple years was “he’s stubborn and won’t change his scheme to fit the players.

2. And this is related to #1, I was listening to the Mike Fisher show today (Thursday the 8th) and in his 6 am show he told a story about when Flus was interviewed and hired he had a huge 3 ring binder of plays that he said he would put in but he didn’t mention any specific players. Fish said this was the first red flag he had a system and the players had to adjust to it, not him adjusting to the players.

So my other close vote would have been us trading Micah but I’m not 100% sure Micah would have been as effective in Flus system. Micah wouldn’t have been the player we’ve known the last 4 years. I feel if Micah stayed he would have regressed like everyone else on D because Flus wouldn’t have game planned to use Micah but would have forced Micah into Flus game plan. JMHO.

On defense this whole season was just a disaster and honestly I’m glad it’s over and Flus is already gone.

 

[Kwyn]

3. Lack of defensive talent. Injuries and JAGs are a fact of life for every team. You deal with it. And...at least on paper...was the talent really "last-in-the-League" bad?

Yes, it was that bad. We need six or seven new starters on defense

 

[BrAinPaiNt]

This is a thread about the defense. Leave Dak out of it.

 

[Hawkeye0202]

Trading the player that the defense was built around, 6 days before the first game.

This!!!!!!
We never recovered. We went through an entire off-season planning and building our defense around our best defensive player, who happens to be one of the top 5 in the league, and lost that 6 days before the season starts?

Hell, the lack of talent has ALWAYS BEEN an issue and Zimm had some of the same issues as Eberflus, just not as bad.

 

[CowboyFanInLexKy]

Too bad the poll didn't allow to pick more than just 1 because it was more than just 1. The defensive players were bad and the DC didn't know how to adjust and work with what he had. One can even a certain front office staff member as one of the options because at the end of the day, That front office staff member's signature is at the bottom of the contracts.

 

[baltcowboy]

Parsons trade. The defensive plan for the season was built off of Parsons ability to rush the passer.

 

[JoeKing]

It's way too easy to blame Eberflus. It's nice to have a scapegoat to explain away the Cowboys defensive struggles in 2025. That would be a denial of what really held this team back. The truth is a bigger pill to swallow. This team lacks defensive talent. It's more complicated than losing Micah or a subpar DC effort. We need more dawgs on this defense! QWill, is a great addition and Clowney did well by season's end, but we need more and it needs to be consistent.

 

[Chocolate Lab]

Yes, the talent was bad, but I still voted Eberflus. It's one thing for, say, a corner to get beat because he's not talented enough. But our guys repeatedly had no idea where to line up, what their zones were, how aggressive to be, nothing. It was the biggest confused mess of a defense I've ever seen.

And it was beyond X and O stuff. I still think the players hated him. He has the personality and motivation skills of a doorstop. Just look at Chicago with and without him.

 

[wecasa]

The DC is responsible for putting the pieces you have in position to make plays. Sure those pieces are flawed, but you have to be able to identify what's best for your squad and do it. Didn't happen at all. It was a lot of the same week after week.