The big run by Barkley: Analysis

[Oz-of-Cowboy-Country]

More teams now run 1-gap scheme than not.

The Cowboys still 2-gap with the LDE on many plays. The 1-tech also 2-gaps at times.

The Seahawks won a Super Bowl playing a 1-gap scheme.

Even the Rams and Wade Phillips play a 1-gap 3-4 scheme.

The days of the pure 2-gap like Parcells tried to implement when the was here are gone.

Barkley only had 61 yards on all other runs in this game.

The Patriots played primarily 1-gap last year. They changed the defensive alignment for the Super Bowl specifically because of the blocking changes the Rams rolled out against the Cowboys. They moved the OLB to the outside of the RDE and had the RDE play the inside gap instead of having outside contain.

This play by the Cowboys had the RDE close the inside gap instead of playing outside contain like they did against the Rams. It's a good sign that they are mixing things up but they have young players that made mistakes. Vander Esch was not the only one that made a mistake. Either Safety Woods or CB Brown should have moved to the inside instead of both staying outside of the block on Woods. Heath in the clean-up role should have moved to the outside to entice Barkley back to the inside where there were other defenders.

There is a saying. "If you spend all of your time pointing the finger you'll never solve the problem."


We are getting hurt in the run game because our linebackers are blindly running up to take their predetermined one gap responsibilities. That's what caused LVE to run directly into the back of Crawford.

So when the RB is lined up directly behind the QB there so many different gaps he can take that our one gap system doesn't work. Especially when you add in the fact that double teams will push our defensive linemen into spots that the linebackers are suppose to be covering.

Most can agree that there is a problem in our run defense. I'm just trying to give a solution. I would love to hear how other posters on this board would solve that problem without changing personal. So in my opinion...

When ever they see the RB lined up directly behind the QB they should switch to a two gap system.

Cause it ain't about who ran this system or who ran that system, it's about solving the problem we have. If we solve the problem we can all write letters to The Star if need be. So if anyone else has a way to solve our problem without making changes in personnel I'd like to hear it.

 

[Hennessy_King]

I guess you can only "analyze" the numbers you like? How is pointing out the truth "nonsense"?

It's ok stash he's put me on ignore as well. If ppl don't agree with him he puts them on ignore.

 

[Stash]

It's ok stash he's put me on ignore as well. If ppl don't agree with him he puts them on ignore.

How bad does it make him look? He wants to consider himself this great "analyst" while everyone else is "emotional", and yet who's the guy who throws a tantrum and runs and hides behind ignore when he's disagreed with?

 

[DanA]

No, in the Rams game Crawford maintained outside contain to a fault and that is one of the things the Rams knew would happen and they exploited it.

It is actually a good sign that the Cowboys are changing things up this season.

Crawford took the LT with him and a WR that was helping the LT.

X.Woods and Brown only had the 1 WR that was blocking Woods to deal with on the outside. They were not having to take on a block by an OL.

By definition the LBs are required to react to the DLinemen. In the Marinelli style of defense, the LBs are the "Brains" of the defense.

If Crawford had maintained outside contain that would be 3 players with outside contain. No defense is designed to have 3 players with outside contain right at the line on run plays.

Crawford either plays the inside gap or he doesn't. Once he does it's the responsibility of other players to cover anything to Crawford's right side.

I have no reason to defend Crawford. I said a few times this off-season that I thought they might cut him and that it's probably time to have younger players replace him.

Why do you keep saying outside contain? Nobody is suggesting Crawford has an outside contain role. He's lined up shading the LT's left shoulder between the TE & the LT. His gap is the C-gap and he plays it poorly on this play. The C gap in this instance is not an outside contain role because with a TE on the end of the formation there is a D gap. Brown is responsible for outside contain and Crawford, asked to play the C gap, is not.

I think if Crawford was switched on he would have swatted the LT to temporarily throw him off balance, driven Ingram into the backfield with a bull rush, before disengaging to the inside to help with the B-gap. He's got the power and skill to do that and inside leverage on a weaker TE. But he's not been in training and 2nd play of the game, was a little rusty, and missed his assignment, completely caught off guard by the TE blocking down on him.

 

[Stash]

There is a saying. "If you spend all of your time pointing the finger you'll never solve the problem."


We are getting hurt in the run game because our linebackers are blindly running up to take their predetermined one gap responsibilities. That's what caused LVE to run directly into the back of Crawford.

So when the RB is lined up directly behind the QB there so many different gaps he can take that our one gap system doesn't work. Especially when you add in the fact that double teams will push our defensive linemen into spots that the linebackers are suppose to be covering.

Most can agree that there is a problem in our run defense. I'm just trying to give a solution. I would love to hear how other posters on this board would solve that problem without changing personal. So in my opinion...

When ever they see the RB lined up directly behind the QB they should switch to a two gap system.

Cause it ain't about who ran this system or who ran that system, it's about solving the problem we have. If we solve the problem we can all write letters to The Star if need be. So if anyone else has a way to solve our problem without making changes in personnel I'd like to hear it.

Why does it have to be "without changing personnel"?

My first order of business would be to stop this charade of Crawford as a RDE. And before anyone tells me that Quinn is back next week, I'm aware of that. And it's still not any excuse to have Crawford screwing things up at RDE. How big of a cluster/debacle is it that this team has a 1st round draft pick inactive while they pay Crawford $10 million a year to put up performances like this? Oh, while he's a public embarrassment in bar fights on TMZ!

There's some Inconvenient Truth for everyone.

Salvage what you can from bad decision-making and put Crawford inside as the rotational 3-tech that he is.

 

[Hennessy_King]

How bad does it make him look? He wants to consider himself this great "analyst" while everyone else is "emotional", and yet who's the guy who throws a tantrum and runs and hides behind ignore when he's disagreed with?

He's so emotional for an old man it's funny tbh. I've been calling him out about jourdan lewis last few days all i've got was crickets. He tried to tell me all offseason jourdan lewis wasn't as good as brown or chido. He didn't even have the heart to say anything to me. No one should take any of his analysis seriously

 

[Stash]

He's so emotional for an old man it's funny tbh. I've been calling him out about jourdan lewis last few days all i've got was crickets. He tried to tell me all offseason jourdan lewis wasn't as good as brown or chido. He didn't even have the heart to say anything to me. No one should take any of his analysis seriously

It's shame to be honest. He puts a lot of time and effort into his analysis, and 9 times out of 10 I agree with him. I enjoy his work and appreciate the effort he clearly puts into it. But to throw a tantrum and run and hide the way he did because someone dared to disagree with him? The exact opposite of the person he claims to be. Don't profess to be "analytical" and then turn into a crybaby that "takes his ball and goes home" the way he did. It effectively invalidates everything else he hopes to accomplish. Who takes a crybaby seriously? You know what it becomes? Propaganda. From someone who wants to try to control the message and can't accept a difference of opinion. That's just noise, and not worth the time.

 

[nalam]

I am not a huge Heath fan but would in no way blame him for that, team was lucky they didn't score there..the front 7 was a mess for like a quarter and a half.

No luck, the CB from other end (Awuzie?) had the speed to catch up with Barkley and drive him outof bounds.

Imo, Heath should not play that far down in a run play , if he cant catch up and make a tackle on RB. I could be wrong.

 

[Hennessy_King]

It's shame to be honest. He puts a lot of time and effort into his analysis, and 9 times out of 10 I agree with him. I enjoy his work and appreciate the effort he clearly puts into it. But to throw a tantrum and run and hide the way he did because someone dared to disagree with him? The exact opposite of the person he claims to be. Don't profess to be "analytical" and then turn into a crybaby that "takes his ball and goes home" the way he did. It effectively invalidates everything else he hopes to accomplish. Who takes a crybaby seriously? You know what it becomes? Propaganda. From someone who wants to try to control the message and can't accept a difference of opinion. That's just noise, and not worth the time.

Some men just can't be a man and just own it when they were wrong. I've been wrong about certain players and I say it right then and there. But when I'm right, man I'm gunnin for you. Like you notice he hasn't put anything up about corner back play.

 

[Oz-of-Cowboy-Country]

Why does it have to be "without changing personnel"?

My first order of business would be to stop this charade of Crawford as a RDE. And before anyone tells me that Quinn is back next week, I'm aware of that. And it's still not any excuse to have Crawford screwing things up at RDE. How big of a cluster/debacle is it that this team has a 1st round draft pick inactive while they pay Crawford $10 million a year to put up performances like this? Oh, while he's a public embarrassment in bar fights on TMZ!

There's some Inconvenient Truth for everyone.

Salvage what you can from bad decision-making and put Crawford inside as the rotational 3-tech that he is.

Personnel changes are out of the question, cause the Cowboys like holding on to their players for some reason. Every year fans want this and fans want that. And every year we get the same players handed back to us.

No upgrades at SS. No upgrades at DT.

 

[Stash]

Some men just can't be a man and just own it when they were wrong. I've been wrong about certain players and I say it right then and there. But when I'm right, man I'm gunnin for you. Like you notice he hasn't put anything up about corner back play.

He sure didn't give a good accounting of himself in this thread. And I hope everyone reading it takes note of that, and weighs his future work accordingly.

 

[Stash]

Personnel changes are out of the question, cause the Cowboys like holding on to their players for some reason. Every year fans want this and fans want that. And every year we get the same players handed back to us.

No upgrades at SS. No upgrades at DT.

Ain't that the truth? The two names at the top of the hit list last year were Heath and Crawford. But "the team likes them" and some fans feel that means they need to defend them. And here we are a year later and the Sam England usual suspects are involved in bad play.

 

[blueblood70]

Yes it is sarcasm. Barkley untouched through the DL and LB's is 100000% unacceptable. We need to change how we play run defense, stop worrying about up the field and worry about gap integrity on run downs. By contrast look at how often pollard was hit behind our line of scrimmage, that's what our defense needs to do against good run teams.

glad my sarcasm meter was accurate LOL we were watching the same game... this happened in the Rams and Colts games..

 

[DanA]

Personnel changes are out of the question, cause the Cowboys like holding on to their players for some reason. Every year fans want this and fans want that. And every year we get the same players handed back to us.

No upgrades at SS. No upgrades at DT.

We drafted a DT in the 2nd round and brought in Covington. Those are meant to be the upgrades at DT.

 

[Stash]

We drafted a DT in the 2nd round and brought in Covington. Those are meant to be the upgrades at DT.

 

[Oz-of-Cowboy-Country]

We drafted a DT in the 2nd round and brought in Covington. Those are meant to be the upgrades at DT.

Haaaaaa. You crack joke. Funny. Funny. Make me laugh.

 

[blueblood70]

We drafted a DT in the 2nd round and brought in Covington. Those are meant to be the upgrades at DT.

one not active the other brought in sparingly.. maybe after they watch the and break down the game , there will be changes.. AP is waiting )

 

[Knotamus]

No, in the Rams game Crawford maintained outside contain to a fault and that is one of the things the Rams knew would happen and they exploited it.

It is actually a good sign that the Cowboys are changing things up this season.

Crawford took the LT with him and a WR that was helping the LT.

X.Woods and Brown only had the 1 WR that was blocking Woods to deal with on the outside. They were not having to take on a block by an OL.

By definition the LBs are required to react to the DLinemen. In the Marinelli style of defense, the LBs are the "Brains" of the defense.

If Crawford had maintained outside contain that would be 3 players with outside contain. No defense is designed to have 3 players with outside contain right at the line on run plays.

Crawford either plays the inside gap or he doesn't. Once he does it's the responsibility of other players to cover anything to Crawford's right side.

I have no reason to defend Crawford. I said a few times this off-season that I thought they might cut him and that it's probably time to have younger players replace him.

Well first... I actually complimented you on your post, so over justifying your point simply bc I disagree with defender responsibility is really a mute point.. exp since neither of us know exactly what their true assignments were.

I watched the same play you did. Imo.. I just have a different take than you. But again, I applauded your breakdown.

First, the defensive alignment was to play run or pass. It was not a sellout and stop the run only. Which definitely makes sense, exp the field position of the Giants. The Giants easily could have called a play action pass hoping our LBers would bite. But they obviously didn’t. Dallas was prepared for either, which is why you seen two DBs on the right side. One to cover the WR, the other to cover Saquon on a possible swing pass. Your assumption that they were their to contain is just that.. an assumption.

Yes, Lber’s have to react in this scheme as you eluded, but they also has specified gaps to maintain as do the DLineman. Crawford didn’t necessarily crash down on his own will, he was simply overmatched by the LT and WR.. which imo, shouldn’t happen to a “RDE”. LVE only had a split second to dissect the direction of the designed play and choose to fill his gap with the idea that Crawford could maintain the edge. One thing Marenilli also preaches, is to control or maintain the edge. Why? So that run plays are funneled inside to the LBers, which is exactly where LVE was.

The fact of the matter is.. Had Crawford not been pushed around and even just held his position.. Saquon would have never had space to run.

So we can piss and moan as to who’s responsibility it was.. but I’d be willing to bet Crawford would say he has to play better than that. My point was.. I believe the fact that Crawford (and Lawrence for that matter) not playing during the preseason caused him to look and play very rusty. I suspect their egos will be checked and they will clean this up by next week.

 

[xwalker]

Why do you keep saying outside contain? Nobody is suggesting Crawford has an outside contain role. He's lined up shading the LT's left shoulder between the TE & the LT. His gap is the C-gap and he plays it poorly on this play. The C gap in this instance is not an outside contain role because with a TE on the end of the formation there is a D gap. Brown is responsible for outside contain and Crawford, asked to play the C gap, is not.

I think if Crawford was switched on he would have swatted the LT to temporarily throw him off balance, driven Ingram into the backfield with a bull rush, before disengaging to the inside to help with the B-gap. He's got the power and skill to do that and inside leverage on a weaker TE. But he's not been in training and 2nd play of the game, was a little rusty, and missed his assignment, completely caught off guard by the TE blocking down on him.

This is going to be long and detailed.

Verbiage

• Yes, I used a shorthand definition meaning outside contain relative the the player that I'm discussing.
• I would have used gap terminology but when I've done that in the past many people didn't understand it.
• I try to keep the wording as simple as possible for message board posting (generally but I'll go into detail on this post).

Barkley's Big Run

• Watch it again (It's easier to see on the coaches film).
• Crawford went inside of the LT to squeeze down the B gap.
• Crawford made a very deliberate move to play the B gap.
• Physically it would have been much easier to play the C gap.
• Both X.Woods and Brown played the D gap.
• LBs are required to react to the DL regardless of the defensive play design.
  • If playing LB in the NFL was as mentally easy as just hitting a specific
  • pre-assigned gap, then Bruce Carter would have been an All Pro.

Summary:

• Crawford made a very deliberate move to play the B gap.
• LVE also played the B gap.
• Woods initially had positioning to play the C gap but ended up in the D gap.
• Brown was also in the D gap.

Fault

• There is no way to know if Crawford was expected to play the B gap or C gap.
• Either way, LBs must react to the DL and find the uncovered gap.
• Both DBs were boxed out to the outside (D gap) against 1 blocker.

Cowboys vs Rams Game

• I did extensive analysis of the Rams game over the off-season.
• I've said repeatedly that the Cowboys should have had the RDE play the B gap against the Rams.
• Specifically on plays where the 1-tech was on the right side of the DL.
• Instead the Cowboys continued to play the C gap with the RDE.
• The Rams exploited the fact that they knew which gap assignments the Cowboys would play.

Reason for RDE to play B gap

• With the RDE playing outside (C or D gap), on outside runs to that side, the 1-tech initially aligned in the A gap would scramble to fill the B gap.
• The MLB was the LB on that side and needed to be able to move to the outside instead of filling the B gap which would be open if the 1-tech didn't fill it.
• The problem is that the Rams knew the 1-tech would flow to the play side taking him out of the middle of the line.
• The MLB would move outside but still needed to watch for the cutback to the inside.
• This allowed the Rams to get a blocker to the inside of the MLB on a run that was designed to be a cut back to the inside.
• They were able to "hold" the OLB on the backside with motion and other specifics within the offensive play design.
• They would then get a blocker to the inside of the backside LB.
• They would initially double the backside DT.
• Both LBs would get boxed out from the middle and the RB had a huge hole in the middle for the cutback run.
• The genius of this blocking was that the blocks on the LBs were delayed blocks.
• The Rams OL could initially have two double team blocks on DLinemen and then kick out 1 OL on each side to get the delayed block on the LBs.

Patriots vs Rams

• The Patriots changed their defense specific to the Rams for the Super Bowl.
• The Pats often had the RDE play the B gap.
• They then made other changes to accommodate this change.
• Some fairly simple changes totally mucked up the Rams precision blocking scheme.

Cowboys Fans should hope that Crawford was correct on his assignment with regards to the big gain by Barkley.

That would indicate that the Cowboys are changing things up that they needed to change vs the Rams in the playoffs.

All other teams saw that game and will try many of the same concepts until the Cowboys prove they can stop it.

 

[xwalker]

Crawford didn’t necessarily crash down on his own will, he was simply overmatched by the LT and WR.. which imo, shouldn’t happen to a “RDE”.

This part is easy. Crawford fought to get inside of the LT.

There was no way for the blockers to get Crawford to the inside of the LT if Crawford was not intentionally trying to get inside.

Crawford had the initial leverage to stay outside of the LT.

Crawford either did or did not make a mental mistake.