News: BTB: Are The Cowboys Developing A Blueprint For Their Secondary?

[NewsBot]

The Dallas defense had problems in all three position groups, including the defensive backs. With the OTAs done, is there a plan emerging for how they hope to upgrade the play of the secondary?

Along with the lack of a pass rush and season-long struggle to find enough healthy linebackers, the Dallas Cowboys also had some very spotty performances from the secondary. It is a tribute to the coaching of Rod Marinelli that he made the material he had to work with look so good, and there was admittedly a bit of smoke and mirrors involved. The one thing the defense was fairly good at was getting timely turnovers. The multiple deficiencies were also masked to some degree by the ball control offense that Dallas ran, which kept the defense on the sidelines in many games, limiting their exposure. Add in some key stops, and Marinelli managed to make it work despite the problems.That, however, fell apart to a great extent in the playoff game against the Green Bay Packers. Making sure that would not happen this season became an obvious priority this offseason.

Now the Cowboys have added talent, through free agency, the draft, and having some injured players return to the field. The most attention has been paid to the defensive line, where the additions of Greg Hardy and Randy Gregory plus the anticipated improvement from players like Tyrone Crawford and DeMarcus Lawrence, is expected to dial up the pass rush more than a notch or two. The return of Sean Lee is in itself a significant boost for the linebackers, and the team also invested there in free agent and draft capital.

The talk has been a little less prevalent about the secondary, even though cornerback Byron Jones was the first overall pick. In 2014, the team had one standout corner in Orlando Scandrick, a serviceable Brandon Carr who appeared to improve his play late in the season, and a couple of safeties in Barry Church and J.J. Wilcox who look more suited to play strong safety than free safety. With the addition of Jones, how much more can Marinelli, Jerome Henderson and Joe Baker get out of the DBs?

Actual production is still to be determined, but what emerged in OTAs was a tantalizing hint of how things may come together. And if this works like the team seems to be hoping it will, then things may be much better indeed.

For information about what goes on at practices, the best source I have found in the years I have been sharing my ramblings is Bryan Broaddus. His experience as a scout shows in what he reports.

One player that almost all the fans have written off is Morris Claiborne. The former first-round pick, obtained with a large expenditure of draft resources, has been a disappointment. Most of this can be traced to him not being healthy since his first training camp with the Cowboys. Last season, he was still struggling and then he went down again with injury before the team even got to October. The ruptured patellar tendon is a very severe injury, far worse than an ACL. It was thought he was doubtful to be ready for the start of training camp this year. But now Broaddus is saying that we may be surprised, based on what he saw during the OTAs, Claiborne was more active than anyone anticipated.

"I think Mo Claiborne is gonna be ready for training camp" - @BryanBroaddus on @1053thefan

— Jeff Cavanaugh (@JC1053) June 12, 2015​

Follow me @TomRyleBTB​

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[Thefeelofcotton]

I hope you're right. I'll be honest I don't know what to look for in the secondary as far as knowing is someone is in the right position or has their shoulders squared up or whatever (I played both OL and DL, I just like push people lol). But I can say our secondary was always a concern of mine last year but that stemmed from lack of pass rush to having no depth.

This year I feel we will have more depth and options as far as certain players fulfilling certain roles. If MO Claiborne can step up and produce just a bit we will be set.

 

[BAT]

Mo is the wildcard. If Marinelli can instill discipline and physicality in Claiborne's game, Cowboys secondary becomes much better generating turnovers. Mo is the most natural playmaker in our back 4. He is at his best when the ball is in the air because he has natural WR instincts and hands. Again, he has to improve his positioning, reading offenses, re-routing receivers and tackling technique. All about discipline. Marinelli has to either make Mo smarter, or make game simpler.

 

[Bullflop]

The secondary has long appeared to take something of a backseat to other positions on the Dallas defense. Lately, it has apparently been given more attention with the arrival of a prime 1st round talent in Byron Jones. Things might additionally seem to be on the rise in the event Maurice Claiborne is able to assume a fairly more prominent role with a possibility of his return to the secondary. How much he may or may not be capable of contributing remains a mystery but would at least offer a tangible measure of hope for greater things to come. Assuming that were to allow Jones to serve some spot duty as a cover FS, things could improve in a hurry.

 

[windjc]

Outside of Scandrick our CBs work better in press than in space. As long as Claiborne is allowed to press his chance for success goes up. Same with Carr. Jones has already said the same about himself.

With Claiborne and Carr, they're never going to be great in space.

Our secondary is best when it's aggressive. If we pair this with a real pass rush, we will have s chance to dictate terms to offenses. But that's a hope at this point.

 

[gmoney112]

Outside of Scandrick our CBs work better in press than in space. As long as Claiborne is allowed to press his chance for success goes up. Same with Carr. Jones has already said the same about himself.

With Claiborne and Carr, they're never going to be great in space.

Our secondary is best when it's aggressive. If we pair this with a real pass rush, we will have s chance to dictate terms to offenses. But that's a hope at this point.

With the offseason development of our DE position, I wouldn't be surprised at all to see a lot more press coverage.

 

[Craig]

It puzzles me that people can confidently say that claiborne needs anything other than health. No one has seen what he has when healthy in a pro game.

 

[big dog cowboy]

Mo is the wildcard. If Marinelli can instill discipline and physicality in Claiborne's game, Cowboys secondary becomes much better generating turnovers.

That sounds great but it all starts with Mo getting and staying healthy.

Until that happens Mo isn't anything more than a "If only..." kind of guy.

 

[xwalker]

Mo is the wildcard. If Marinelli can instill discipline and physicality in Claiborne's game, Cowboys secondary becomes much better generating turnovers. Mo is the most natural playmaker in our back 4. He is at his best when the ball is in the air because he has natural WR instincts and hands. Again, he has to improve his positioning, reading offenses, re-routing receivers and tackling technique. All about discipline. Marinelli has to either make Mo smarter, or make game simpler.

It puzzles me that people can confidently say that claiborne needs anything other than health. No one has seen what he has when healthy in a pro game.

That sounds great but it all starts with Mo getting and staying healthy.

Until that happens Mo isn't anything more than a "If only..." kind of guy.

It would be great if Claiborne could step up and be a consistent quality CB; however, I see the odds of that happening to be low. He didn't do in in 3 years prior and now he is returning from a major injury to his knee. It would be questionable if a previously great player would be good in his 1st season after a major knee injury, but for a guy that has yet to do it, the knee injury is an even bigger issue.

My understanding is a torn Patella is a worse injury than a torn ACL.

 

[BoysfanfromCanada]

If the Alan Ball experiment taught me anything, it's that the ability to play two positions doesn't necessarily mean you're even average at both.

 

[mahoneybill]

Mo is the wildcard. If Marinelli can instill discipline and physicality in Claiborne's game, Cowboys secondary becomes much better generating turnovers. Mo is the most natural playmaker in our back 4. He is at his best when the ball is in the air because he has natural WR instincts and hands. Again, he has to improve his positioning, reading offenses, re-routing receivers and tackling technique. All about discipline. Marinelli has to either make Mo smarter, or make game simpler.

Lets hope Rod can work his magic on Mo. The price we paid to get him was too high for what we have seen so far

 

[Toruk_Makto]

The secondary has long appeared to take something of a backseat to other positions on the Dallas defense. Lately, it has apparently been given more attention with the arrival of a prime 1st round talent in Byron Jones. Things might additionally seem to be on the rise in the event Maurice Claiborne is able to assume a fairly more prominent role with a possibility of his return to the secondary. How much he may or may not be capable of contributing remains a mystery but would at least offer a tangible measure of hope for greater things to come. Assuming that were to allow Jones to serve some spot duty as a cover FS, things could improve in a hurry.

It's hard to argue the secondary has taken a back seat when you have a guy on a 50m contract, a guy that was drafted top 6 and a guy who has gotten a reworked contract 4 times.

In fact the argument around here for a long time was that we spent too much resources on skinny vs fat guys.

 

[BAT]

Lets hope Rod can work his magic on Mo. The price we paid to get him was too high for what we have seen so far

Agreed. And while I am not a Mo fan, I am a Cowboy fan and hope this kid can turn it around. Neither his athleticism nor his football IQ are anything special but his ability to play the ball when it's up for grabs could be elite. It's almost like he's a more natural receiver than defender.

 

[Bullflop]

It's hard to argue the secondary has taken a back seat when you have a guy on a 50m contract, a guy that was drafted top 6 and a guy who has gotten a reworked contract 4 times.

In fact the argument around here for a long time was that we spent too much resources on skinny vs fat guys.

Well, I was referring solely to the secondary 'taking a back seat' in terms of the talent that has been assembled for that area. We should thank God and Will McClay that this year appears to be an exception in that regard.

 

[Longboysfan]

The Cowboys are just looking to repeat what they did on the O line as into the secondary.
After that is corrected - hopefully this and next year. They can draft for need.

 

[rockj7]

Big Dog when Mo is healthy How good is he? I ask cause all that sticks in my mind is that Rams game last year when he was getting torched

 

[big dog cowboy]

Big Dog when Mo is healthy How good is he? I ask cause all that sticks in my mind is that Rams game last year when he was getting torched

At this point it is hard to say. He hasn't been completely healthy since we drafted him. Will he ever be 100% again? Who knows. About the only thing we fans can be assured of is we have no idea what to expect when he finally walks on the field.