Are Cowboys Deficiencies able to be fixed this offseason?

The primary deficiency is the front 4. We need to get better up front, and it'll take the team very far.
 
casmith07 said:
The primary deficiency is the front 4. We need to get better up front, and it'll take the team very far.
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I'm sure it would take us farther than we have been, although we have many more solutions that desperately await us than just our front 4.
 
Bullflop said:
I think it's extremely difficult to fill positions of need through the draft unless a team is and has been extremely adept at drafting. We have been doing better in recent years, although even teams that draft skillfully are likely to have positions now and then that require attention through free agency. I'm not talking here about making a habit of doing it every year, although teams that handle their caps better than we do are able to satisfy their needs when necessary.

I'm not a proponent of restructuring as we have done every year for who knows how long. Kicking the financial can down the road each and every year isn't any way to maintain a healthy financial structure in my opinion, although I don't claim to be a financial expert.

Perhaps going exclusively through the draft might eventually pay off -- that's hard to say without committing to it as a long term solution. I'm picturing it as something that will possibly take many years, as long as restructuring remains our supposed solution. Right now, we're in a tough situation, trying to catch with our cap difficulties stubbornly persisting.

I'm not at all confident that continuing to restructure players as we do (and likely will continue to do) might afford us a healthy financial environment anytime in the foreseeable future. It appears to me that whatever we gain from Romo's retirement is likely to be offset by delaying our financial health via restructuring as frequently and habitually as we have been and may very well continue to do. I hope I'm wrong on that. Time will tell.
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Restructuring has yet to catch up to the Cowboys. They could have created plenty of cap space if they wanted to sign free agents.

The free agent options were not very good.

They didn't want to be stuck with middle of the road players including their own guys like Carr and Church.

Stephen Jones has made comments basically saying that if a free agent is really great, that his own team will generally find a way to keep him. He was basically saying most free agents have warts.

Realistically, what players from this list would the Cowboys want to be tied to for the next 4 years?
http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap30...017-nfl-free-agency-top-101-available-players

I can't prove it, but I have a very reliable source that says the Cowboys would have considered spending big on Eric Berry if he had made it to free agency.
 
xwalker said:
Restructuring has yet to catch up to the Cowboys. They could have created plenty of cap space if they wanted to sign free agents.

The free agent options were not very good.

They didn't want to be stuck with middle of the road players including their own guys like Carr and Church.

Stephen Jones has made comments basically saying that if a free agent is really great, that his own team will generally find a way to keep him. He was basically saying most free agents have warts.
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So true. I love the way the Cowboys approached FA this off season.
 
xwalker said:
Restructuring has yet to catch up to the Cowboys. They could have created plenty of cap space if they wanted to sign free agents.

The free agent options were not very good.

They didn't want to be stuck with middle of the road players including their own guys like Carr and Church.

Stephen Jones has made comments basically saying that if a free agent is really great, that his own team will generally find a way to keep him. He was basically saying most free agents have warts.

Realistically, what players from this list would the Cowboys want to be tied to for the next 4 years?
http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap30...017-nfl-free-agency-top-101-available-players

I can't prove it, but I have a very reliable source that says the Cowboys would have considered spending big on Eric Berry if he had made it to free agency.
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The Cowboys could, indeed, have created more cap space, although the way they would have done so is by restructuring and continuing to procrastinate catching up with their financial responsibilities to future years. At some point, the burden of paying the piper for that privilege returns with a vengeance down the road.

I'm OK with avoiding overpaying those who lack the skills to earn their keep. Granted, this year was far from one that had a wealth of those who might have been worth the asking price. I'm just hoping our restructuring routine fades into oblivion sometime in the foreseeable future.
 
OP: Are the Cowboys deficiencies able to be fixed this offseason?

No

The d line, will not be fixed this off season. IMO they are 2 years away, unless they utilize free agency.
If they utilize free agency, maybe next year.
 
Teams can be transformed in a year easily, if they are willing to spend big in free agency and then hit it big in the draft.

Dallas is taking the conservative approach, mainly building from just the draft and lower level free agents. The concept has worked over and over for some teams...the Steelers are probably the best example. They rarely go into free agency yet always seem to be able to have a player step right in and take over. Seattle has been good for a while but certainly showed a lot of chinks in their armor last year...it will be interesting to see how they continue to build now that a good bit of the Legion of Doom is gone or getting old.

We had a defense a year ago that was pretty much middle of the road. Played good at times, played crappy at times. From that group we have lost both starting corners, a starting safety and some of the DL depth in McClain and Crawford. The good news is that most of these players were average to good at best, some not even average. There is some hope that Tapper can come back healthy and basically be another "draft pick" for this year. Of course, if the Jaylon Smith experiment pans out, then we are a heck a lot closer to where we want to be. We have some hope in Irving and Collins....if their development continues the defense can easily improve. Crawford and Lawrence both have to shake off so-so and bad seasons and play up to their pay level and draft level.

At this point, I definitely think on defense we have big needs at DE, CB and S with a lesser need at LB and DT. Don't really see any significant help coming at any of those spots in free agency so we need another home run draft. On offense, the immediate needs are less but we still need a legit RT, even though we have several bodies I am not sure any of them are the answer. A deep threat WR and a change of pace back are probably the other big needs on offense. Those can be addressed later in the draft IMO. I would guess first 3 out of 4 top picks will be on defense.
 
Bullflop said:
The Cowboys could, indeed, have created more cap space, although the way they would have done so is by restructuring and continuing to procrastinate catching up with their financial responsibilities to future years. At some point, the burden of paying the piper for that privilege returns with a vengeance down the road.

I'm OK with avoiding overpaying those who lack the skills to earn their keep. Granted, this year was far from one that had a wealth of those who might have been worth the asking price. I'm just hoping our restructuring routine fades into oblivion sometime in the foreseeable future.
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No, actually an NFL team can restructure forever.

I presented the long version of this years ago, but I'll give you the short version.

What If you could go to your bank and get a 100K loan for 1-year for zero interest? Then at the end of that year you get another 1-year, zero interest loan to pay back the previous loan. You would never actually have to pay back the 100K if you could keep getting the next loan every year.

In real life loans do require interest which kills this concept; however, a salary cap "loan" does not require interest.

Under the cap a team can push some amount forward every year without it ever "catching up" to them because they can always push more forward the next year. It's even better than the example because the cap increases every year.

The Cowboys have been pushing money forward for a long long time and they can still create more cap space right now. It has not "caught up" to them yet.

The closest they came was the 2nd year that they Franchised Anthony Spencer which I believe was the 1st year of Romo's new contract. They were very close to having all possible contracts restructured that year. In comparison to then, they have plenty of "available space" that can be created with restructures now.

The "cost" comes in real dollars because the team has to pay out a lot of real dollars up front. With the time value of real dollars, that is a big expense, but it has no bearing on the cap.

@bkight13
 
CowboyRoy said:
Agreed to a point, but do you really expect rookies to come in and make a big impact on defense? All you guys touting Zeke because he was the one that could have "the greatest impact" of any player last year. The same guys telling us defense first guys that defensive guys take a few years to get going and they wouldnt make much of an impact. Now I am hearing that we can fix everything in one draft, that these defensive rookies will fix things, yada, yada, yada. Seems some of you cats use logic when it suits you and reverse field when it doesn't.

And both Tapper and Smith are not out of the injury shadow yet. Both guys missing an entire year of football and being rookies themselves. Now maybe a few years down the line all these young guys could play up, but you are asking a lot for things to be fixed and ready to go next year. More than likely, it will get worse before it gets better. The one thing about the older guys that left is that they all knew the system back and forth and played together for years. It will be one mistake after another with all these young guys.
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I understand why you guys are referring to tapper and Jaylon as rookies since they were effectively redshirted last year. The fact is that they are not rookies.

Jaylon and Tapper had one important thing going for them that rookies do not have. They had exposure to the pro game for one full year. Coaching, nutrition, film study, getting paid full time to improve their game, no outside distractions to keep them away from football (classroom) and watching the game firsthand. They have also been around pros like Sean Lee who has showed them the right way to learn and prepare.

I expect both of them have taken full advantage of their year with the Cowboys. If not they would be super foolish. I don't think either of them fall into that class. Both of them are hungry to getting back to what they do at a high level. If healthy, I would actually be SURPRISED if the dont BOTH make a SIGNIFICANT impact this year.
 
LocimusPrime said:
OP: Are the Cowboys deficiencies able to be fixed this offseason?

No

The d line, will not be fixed this off season. IMO they are 2 years away, unless they utilize free agency.
If they utilize free agency, maybe next year.
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Actually the DL might end up being the strongest unit on the defense without any additions at all if Tapper comes into camp healthy. One good DE could make that much difference on this line. The DTS are probably good enough, although I would really rather have a monster at the 1 tech.

I think Rod's quicker 1 Tech is for the birds since they aren't getting to the QB anyway. I would rather have that monster collapsing the pocket into the face of the QB but unfortunately I don't see that happening anytime soon.
 
xwalker said:
No, actually an NFL team can restructure forever.

I presented the long version of this years ago, but I'll give you the short version.

What If you could go to your bank and get a 100K loan for 1-year for zero interest? Then at the end of that year you get another 1-year, zero interest loan to pay back the previous loan. You would never actually have to pay back the 100K if you could keep getting the next loan every year.

In real life loans do require interest which kills this concept; however, a salary cap "loan" does not require interest.

Under the cap a team can push some amount forward every year without it ever "catching up" to them because they can always push more forward the next year. It's even better than the example because the cap increases every year.

The Cowboys have been pushing money forward for a long long time and they can still create more cap space right now. It has not "caught up" to them yet.

The closest they came was the 2nd year that they Franchised Anthony Spencer which I believe was the 1st year of Romo's new contract. They were very close to having all possible contracts restructured that year. In comparison to then, they have plenty of "available space" that can be created with restructures now.

The "cost" comes in real dollars because the team has to pay out a lot of real dollars up front. With the time value of real dollars, that is a big expense, but it has no bearing on the cap.

@bkight13
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The Cowboys stopped doing max restructures 3 years ago.....they left Carr alone even thought they kept him the full 5 years....... they didn't max out Romo last year....they didn't do Dez this year or last

They have left 20-30m to die on the vine....... the biggest myth is DAL uses these credit cards and now the bills have come due..... the fact is they DON'T use their cash on hand advantage to their largest benefit.....they are caught half way between austerity and maxing out.... they love to appear cap poor because they do not want to spend any real money on FAs....so they hide their cap space instead of rolling it over

DAL had over 60m in cap space this year by cutting Romo....yet they dribble it out in stages instead of all at once in March....if they had 50m in space fans and media would demand a huge signing or two .......this way they don't have to

Restructures are never the problem...they should always be used with guaranteed contracts....not using them is overpaying today for no reason......it is not better or smarter.......it is a very very very conservative way of working the cap .....paying Dez 17m on the cap this year is just dumb when they could be spending 8m........ the excess could be rolled over or wait for it.......spent on a player that could help this year
 
Verdict said:
Actually the DL might end up being the strongest unit on the defense without any additions at all if Tapper comes into camp healthy. One good DE could make that much difference on this line. The DTS are probably good enough, although I would really rather have a monster at the 1 tech.

I think Rod's quicker 1 Tech is for the birds since they aren't getting to the QB anyway. I would rather have that monster collapsing the pocket into the face of the QB but unfortunately I don't see that happening anytime soon.
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i have no faith in this DL, but would be happy for them to prove me wrong! In regards to being the best unit on the defense, that would mean the rest of defense sucks really really bad lol
 
Verdict said:
I understand why you guys are referring to tapper and Jaylon as rookies since they were effectively redshirted last year. The fact is that they are not rookies.

Jaylon and Tapper had one important thing going for them that rookies do not have. They had exposure to the pro game for one full year. Coaching, nutrition, film study, getting paid full time to improve their game, no outside distractions to keep them away from football (classroom) and watching the game firsthand. They have also been around pros like Sean Lee who has showed them the right way to learn and prepare.

I expect both of them have taken full advantage of their year with the Cowboys. If not they would be super foolish. I don't think either of them fall into that class. Both of them are hungry to getting back to what they do at a high level. If healthy, I would actually be SURPRISED if the dont BOTH make a SIGNIFICANT impact this year.
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:hammer::hammer::hammer:


So good it deserves 3.
 
ShiningStar said:
I can say this, we have been replacing and rebuilding this defense for over 20 years. its going to be the best defense ever.
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yeah it is a long "process" lol.
Dak welcome to tony's world !!

To me the defense is a big ? mark, I wont say or know how they will do till at least pre season games, and then regular season a few games.
It doesnt look good, but a ways to go players to add, and then just see how it all works when they start playing.
They should get better as the season rolls on if no big injuries, but I expect to allow more points per game this season, maybe a lot more.
 
The Cowboys must find pressure. Too many questions on the defense this year. The club is a couple years away...but the offense is young and there is ample time for the defense to catch up. Drafting is the real road to the SB. McClay and friends really need to nail the draft this year. They will need a little luck too.
 
"Fixing". What does that mean? Cure everything, or good enough to compete?

No NFL team is ever going to have every deficiency "fixed". I'll go ahead and say if that's something you really expect, blow your brains out right now because you'll never be happy.

Good enough to be a contender? Sure. Good enough to win a Super Bowl? Unlikely, but crazier things have happened. Even with a great team, injuries can derail your season instantly.

Just chill and watch the young guys compete. There's a lot of young talent, and we're about to have more. Hope they draft a pass rusher with some talent and a couple DB's that can force turnovers. I'm just thankful after the last few years, even if our young CB's aren't as seasoned as Carr/Mo, at least they'll probably produce some damn turnovers.
 
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