Things I learned about the Cowboys from Romo

DenCWBY · Nov 6, 2017

Temo said:
A lot of these I'm sure we already knew, but it was cool to see it confirmed by him...

1) Garrett is responsible for the Cowboys playing very conservative when backed up in their own 20. (Though it should be noted that we took a shot down field on 3rd and long backed up right after Romo said this)

2) Romo really respects T-Will's run blocking and his ability to run after the catch.

3) Romo feels Dez is one of the absolute best in being able to high point a ball and come down to it, and they practiced it together after practice was over. This is backed up by Dez's ridiculous red zone performance over the years, and the way he declined with Dak... Romo and Dez practiced it together for years.

4) Right after Dez left the game, Romo started talking about how that would impact the run game because the Chiefs could play more man coverage.

5) Romo confirmed that the Cowboys' defensive philosophy is to give up smaller gains and take away the big play.

6) Lawrence was really limited by his back issues last year, as Romo mentioned once. He also said that Tyron has been limited by back issues for 2 years now.

7) He mentioned how the Cowboys love running the WR screen to Beasely when they need to kill time but don't want to run into a stacked front. Then they actually did just that... though they actually ran it with T-Will instead, but the concept was there).

Anything else I missed?

Ken said:
Which is a little strange to me that he wouldn't be a bit more involved in the offense. He was an offensive coordinator, so I would have expected him to influence the offense. I know he is big picture during the game, but I was surprised by this the most I think.

I was thinking the same thing. I figured he would be very involved in consultation with the OC about certain plays in situational football scenarios. I even ventured to think that he would be analyzing other our competitions offensive schemes to help our defensive preparations. Guess not.

khiladi · Nov 6, 2017

Chuck 54 said:
This is one of the dumber things I've seen posted .... ever. If you want to argue that Garrett isn't a good head coach, I can listen to that argument. Any coach who has never won an NFC championship or SB could have that argument made about him. But it's really stupid to try and say Garrett is not a football guy.

Jason Garrett was employed as a QB for 13 seasons in the NFL. Despite limited physical ability, he was successful as the primary backup. In his 7 years in Dallas, he threw 11 TD's filling in for Troy Aikman and other injured QBs with only 5 INTs, with an 83.2 QBR. He did that because he was a football guy who understood schemes.
Pass attempts: 2940
Pass completions: 1650
Percentage: 56.1
He was hired as the QB coach in Miami by Nick Saban, who clearly thought he was a football guy. In 2007 he was hired by Dallas as offensive coordinator. Maybe you don't remember that he led Dallas to the 2nd best offense in the NFL as the coordinator/playcaller. Jerry made him the highest paid assistant in the NFL, not because he was nuts, but because the Ravens and Falcons made him offers after interviewing for their head coaching jobs. Later, he was also interviewed in Detroit, Denver, and Saint Louis where he was a finalist for the job before Jerry made a move and hired him here.

You can say he's made mistakes; you can say he's not a successful coach; you can even suggest that we will never win with him if that's what you believe. But to say he's not a football guy is totally ridiculous unless you suggest you know better than that many people who actually work in the NFL. He was very successful as our offensive playcaller, and you can't do that without being a football guy.

He led them in 2007 when Sparano was actually baby-sitting him and they tried hiring Sparano back in 2012, when he took the Jets job and they ended up with Callahan, who was released from the Jets. When Sparano left, Garrett's 'success' as a play-caller dropped off dramatically as we progressed to amongst the bottom teams in red-zone success, while we still gathered yards. Basically teams just gave us yardage in the 20 and locked us down and Garrett couldn't devise plays to get his team in the end-zone. By the end of Garrett's tenure we basically were running no huddle and we were bottom in the league in play-action pass for years.

And St. Louis was going to offer him a job and the FO was inundated with telephone calls expressing absolute disdain after Garrett was exposed and nobody wanted him. The Ravens and Falcons made him offers off that first go and never rued the fact they didn't take him and if you ask any of those organizations to take Garrett now, they'd laugh in your faces. In fact, pretty much Ravens fans trolled Garrett when they got Harbaugh and they whooped us. And Harbaugh got them a SB and consistent playoff appearances.

khiladi · Nov 6, 2017

Romo also mentioned, besides Tank's health, that he lost weight and is playing lighter than before and it's really helped him.

zrinkill · Nov 6, 2017

TheCount said:
The stuff he said about Garrett just confirmed what we all suspected. Jason doesn't have much to do with the actual football, his job is to motivate players that need motivation.

Jimmy Johnson was the same way.

Blackspider214 · Nov 6, 2017

Doc50 said:
He also confirmed that JG is not an X's and O's kind of coach; he chooses to influence his team as a leader and motivator.
He's more about creating an environment of winning, looking at the big picture, mental and physical toughness, etc.

I didn't need Romo to confirm that about the red headed clapper. It is obvious he knows nothing about X's and O's.

And if he's about creating an environment for winning and mental toughness, he has failed miserably so far in his tenure here.

ConceptCoop · Nov 6, 2017

I love Tony Romo. That is all.

CanadianCowboysFan · Nov 6, 2017

CowboysWillRise said:
Lol, you know he had to bite his tongue. He also didnt seem too homer or like he was trying really hard to be non biased, which is what I personally think Aikman does.

I laughed when he said all week the producers said remember it isn't "we" or "us" this year. Of course he wanted us to win but he was very professional in the booth. I learn more about the game from him than anyone.

TheCount · Nov 6, 2017

HoosierCowboy said:
Several have said that Garrett is not a football guy or does not know football because he delegates to assistants. That is a false dichotomy. You can be both. I remember a coach at Bama named Bear who chose to delegate to his assistance and manage them but let them coach--he did okay.

I didn't say he's not a football guy or he doesn't know anything about football.

Bringing up Bear Bryant in this context is a bit like bringing up Kurt Warner when talking about recruiting grocery store clerks to QB your NFL team.

Nevermind that Bear had over 20 years of coaching experience before landing at Bama.

Temo · Nov 6, 2017

Risen Star said:
He said the Cowboys secondary isn't fast.

I'm not sure I agree with that. Scandrick, Brown, Jones. They all can run.

Scandrick looks slow ** these days, and seems to be getting by on smarts/experience more than anything.

TheCount · Nov 6, 2017

zrinkill said:
Jimmy Johnson was the same way.

I disagree.

Jimmy was great at talent acquisition; whether via draft, free agency or trade. He wasn't just a rah-rah kind of guy.

Maybe Garrett is behind acquiring guys like David Irving, Dak Prescott, etc. but that's certainly not the narrative right now.

Tractor1 · Nov 6, 2017

CowboysWillRise said:
The funny thing about Dak to Dez is they were on fire last year during the preseason. Say what you want but the chemistry was there.

Romo did a great job. He also pointed out Garrett wasnt an Xs and Os coach and was more about culture and organization. Which is kind of weak but also neccessary. It basically means your coordinators need to be damn good.

A walk around coach. Jimmy made it work.

loublue22 · Nov 6, 2017

CowboyRoy said:
Yep, its what we always knew. Garrett is basically NOT a football guy. He's nothing more than a figurehead/motivator/clappy guy. He's an organizer. Too bad it took Jerry Jones 7 years to figure that out. Garret had no business being in charge of the offense as OC and then no business being a head coach with OC duties. It wasnt until Jerry finally kicked Garrett to the curb and FORCED him to give up the play calling duties that this team began to improve. Too bad he didnt just fire him outright.

If we could just hire a clock management coordinator and a stop getting stupid penalties coordinator we'd be set.

TheGoat73 · Nov 6, 2017

CowboysWillRise said:
Lol, you know he had to bite his tongue. He also didnt seem too homer or like he was trying really hard to be non biased, which is what I personally think Aikman does.

Aikman goes much too far. Can’t stand to hear him call a game.

zrinkill · Nov 6, 2017

TheCount said:
I disagree.

That Jimmy was not an X's and O's guy?

SultanOfSix · Nov 6, 2017

Jimmy may not have been a great Xs and Os guy, but he knew the game. He also knew talent acquisition, game management, and how to motivate players. I think his psychology degree helped him in the latter as well as understanding things like momentum.

Blake · Nov 6, 2017

Blackspider214 said:
And if he's about creating an environment for winning and mental toughness, he has failed miserably so far in his tenure here.

Riiiight....

Jake · Nov 6, 2017

Doc50 said:
He also confirmed that JG is not an X's and O's kind of coach; he chooses to influence his team as a leader and motivator.
He's more about creating an environment of winning, looking at the big picture, mental and physical toughness, etc.

Which is really a CEO's role, or a head coach in this case. Your coordinators are supposed to be the X and O guys.

NoLuv4Jerry · Nov 6, 2017

erod said:
LOL

Jimmy Johnson employed EXACTLY the same philosophy. Didn't do any schematics at all. Just built a culture and acquired talent to suit it.

Same for Pete Carroll, John Harbaugh, Mike Tomlin, etc, and countless coaches from the past.

You have to be a supreme motivator and disciplinarian to win with this approach. Jason falls short. He would have never been able to coach Charles haley

Idgit · Nov 6, 2017

I disagree with a lot of the way the Romo comments are being twisted as far as Garrett and his coaching philosophy goes here, but don't really want to get into that tired debate again. I will say that it sounded to me like Tony went into the week looking for an opportunity to make the comment he made about Jason, and I thought it was interesting that what he chose to bring up was not insulting, but it did have a loaded implication. There's something to the idea that those two had a falling out of sorts on Tony's way out the door.

Also, when I heard that comment, I thought to myself, "I bet we hear Tony go off on Linehan's creativity or play calling later in the broadcast." I was wrong, he didn't really do that beyond praising a really good play call, but it occurred to me that he came in intending to make a point about Garrett and team culture v. Linehan and X's and O's.

In any event, it was really cool to hear Tony's take on what Dallas does philosophically. I hope to hear him do more Cowboys games down the road the next few years.

Gameover · Nov 6, 2017

SultanOfSix said:
Jimmy may not have been a great Xs and Os guy, but he knew the game. He also knew talent acquisition, game management, and how to motivate players. I think his psychology degree helped him in the latter as well as understanding things like momentum.

Jason knows the game

You don't like the talent the Cowboys have acquired over the last 5 to 7 years?

And Jimmy inherited great talent and was gift wrapped one of the all time great QB prospects(Aikman)

I think the most underappreciated thing about Jason has been his ability to motivate his team.If he didn't, he would've been gone years ago. Wade Phillips, 2010.

Things I learned about the Cowboys from Romo

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