I have to agree with Simms, even though I find him a bit goofy at times.
Look at the Eagles' first drive.The had a 1st and 10 at the Dallas 34. Then they committed a delay of game, which was followed by a sack. That gave them a 2nd and 23 at the Cowboys 47. An 8 yard pass to Brown, a 12 yard pass to Brown and a 15 yard pass on 4th down to Goedert and they were on the 12 yard line. The next play was a TD to take an early lead.
The Dallas defense does not get enough blame for this loss. At one point the Eagles had 4 drives at the end of the 2nd quarter and to start the 3rd quarter and scored TDs easily on 3 of the 4 drives. That was the game right there.
This defense does not have a killer mode. I get it, the Eagles have a great offensive line, and good skill position players. It is hard to stop Brown, and Smith and Goedert. But if this defense wants to claim how good they are, they need to do better aginast teams with capable offenses. Go back to the Cardinals game. The Cowboys closed teh gap to 21-16 and on the very next Cardinals possession the defense gave up another TD to put the game out of reach. The Cowboys did not score another point and lost to a 1-8 team, their only win coming against Dallas.
And while we talk about how well we did against the Eagles, Washington scored 31 against them twice. Anyone who thinks that game will be a pushover is very wrong.
The Cowboys scored 23 points, NE scored 20 against them, Minnesota scored 28, even the Jets scored 20.
IMO, the Cowboys offense and the Cowboys defense suffer from the same problem. They cannot deliver the knockout blow when they need to. When the Cowboys took a 14-7 lead instead of stopping the Eagles on the next possession, they gave up another TD. Then with more than 5 minutes to go in the half, the Cowboys drove and settled for a FG. Then to start the 3rd quarter the Eagles get the ball and score a TD. The Cowboys get the ball back, go nowhere and punt. The Eagles take teh ball and score another TD to make it 28-17.
While people are blaming Dak for stepping out of bounds on a 2 pt conversion they ignore the defense that could not stop the Eagles when the Eagles mounted meaningful drives. I want to believe the Cowboys are close to the Eagles but when I look at this stuff there is a perspective that the Cowboys are not as close as we would like to believe, on offense or defense.
In their defense I would say with Diggs, maybe the Eagles do not score one of their 4 TDs. But we have to play the cards we are dealt.
Having said all that, I think without Goedert the Eagles offense is going to be a little less effective. I think they are very beatable now. With their schedule anything can happen.
