Cowboys have not played the elite NFL run teams. The true test is this Sunday.

[TruBlueCowboy]

Sorry I disagree I think Shaun is = to or better than LT. actually to say one is better than the other is hard to do. Both pick up the blitz well, both have soft hands and are VG receivers, and both can run over, around, and thru almost anyone.

Yeah, he's always been underrated, if you can say someone is just that even after being at the top of the league in running several times. I think that goes with playing in Seattle. It's like playing for the Cardinals. Ugly uniforms and no glorious history like the Cowboys, Raiders or 49ers.

 

[Nors]

San Diego is a dominant running team and we shut LT down.


This is what I heard all offseason - we can't play 3-4. We'll get run over. WAAAAA - small lil linebackers WAAAAAA

Run at Fergoson, Spears, Canty till you are blue in the face. Ware, Shanle, James. Fajita and Burnett will be picking off RB's all over the place.


And last but not least - your running right into ROY!

 

[Kilyin]

Sarcasm noted, but that means we count Dallas as an elite defense. Seattle has already proven for the last few years they're one of the better running teams. The new Dallas defense has proven they can shut down the pass, but they haven't really proven much against the run yet.

That's strange, I would say the exact opposite. We've proven we can stop the run, I consider Lamont Jordan an aberration. The pass, that's another story.

 

[TruBlueCowboy]

That's strange, I would say the exact opposite. We've proven we can stop the run, I consider Lamont Jordan an aberration. The pass, that's another story.

The Cowboys just shut down one of the most lethal passing offenses and brighest young QBs in the NFl last Sunday. Before that game, the Giants were #2 in the NFL in yards/reception. Except for two blown plays, the Cowboys shut down Marc Brunell and Santana Moss. Except for one blown play, the Cowboys shut down Randy Moss. The Cowboys shut down Terrell Owens. I don't know how you can think they have problems in that area. And if Lamont Jordan of all players is running all over the Cowboys defense, then that tells ya something.

Don't get offended. I'm a Cowboys fan too and hope this defense becomes the best in the league. I'm just saying teams have had some success running the ball against us and we haven't really faced a top NFL team yet with an established elite running game that just decided to get down and dirty and run it until we proved we couldn't stop them.

 

[AdamJT13]

Sarcasm noted, but that means we count Dallas as an elite defense. Seattle has already proven for the last few years they're one of the better running teams. The new Dallas defense has proven they can shut down the pass, but they haven't really proven much against the run yet.

I don't see how shutting down Alexander would suddenly "prove" anything that hasn't been proven already, considering what we've already done. Our run defense has been sort of like our pass defense, or our defense in general. We've shown we're capable of completely shutting down quality competition. But at times (as with any defense) we can make mediocre competition look great.

We essentially shut down Tomlinson, Portis, Westbrook and Barber, but we let LaMont Jordan and Kevan Barlow/Frank Gore have big games. We shut down Randy Moss, Terrell Owens and Plaxico Burress, but we let Brandon Lloyd and Keenan McCardell have big games. We shut down Philly's offense and the Giants' offense, but we let San Francisco put up 24 offensive points.

Let's say we hold Alexander to 19 carries for 76 yards and one touchdown, and we win 24-20. Does that mean we won't let Marcel Shipp run for 100 yards the next week? Of course not.

The problem I have is with the statement that we haven't played an "elite running team." We have, and we basically shut it down.

 

[Galian Beast]

We've played against:

LaDainian Tomlinson (best running back in the league)
Clinton Portis
Tiki Barber

And we shut them all down.

The defense keeps getting better every game too.

Going up against Arizona, St. Louis, and Houston tends to elevate your numbers....

 

[Nors]

http://www.nfl.com/stats/teamsort/NFL/DEF-RUSHING/2005/regular?sort_col_1=7

We are #8th in NFL against the run.

I'd bet we are stuffing a lot of runs forcing a lot of 3rd and longs. Its the 3rd and longs why we are sack crazy this year. We are able to pin back after QB's. It'd be interesting to see where Dallas stands on forcing 3rd and longs?


Not sure if they keep that stat?

 

[Justis]

I agree. Anytime your tailback picks up almost 200 yards, you have a great chance to win. Somehow I don't think we'll catch 'em snoozing this time around. They know how dangerous he is now.

That's good too. Even without Crayton we have a scary passing offense. If these guys try to shut down Julius, you can watch Bledsoe have another three touchdown game. We have a great catch-22 offense again. God, I hope Julius plays.

 

[Qwickdraw]

Okay...

LT is not elite?


This was probably already stated above but I didnt read it.

 

[Kilyin]

The Cowboys just shut down one of the most lethal passing offenses and brighest young QBs in the NFl last Sunday. Before that game, the Giants were #2 in the NFL in yards/reception. Except for two blown plays, the Cowboys shut down Marc Brunell and Santana Moss. Except for one blown play, the Cowboys shut down Randy Moss. The Cowboys shut down Terrell Owens. I don't know how you can think they have problems in that area. And if Lamont Jordan of all players is running all over the Cowboys defense, then that tells ya something.

Don't get offended. I'm a Cowboys fan too and hope this defense becomes the best in the league. I'm just saying teams have had some success running the ball against us and we haven't really faced a top NFL team yet with an established elite running game that just decided to get down and dirty and run it until we proved we couldn't stop them.

It was two passes that lost us the Commanders game though. Portis did nothing. Sure, we shut down their passing attack for 57 minutes, but we needed to do it for 3 more. Tim Rattay passed all over us like he was Joe Montana. You could argue it was both the running game and passing game of Oakland we failed to stop. We lost regardless of how ya slice it. We let the Giants take the game into overtime on a pass to Cocky. Tiki Barber couldn't do much.

Just seems like people easily dismiss the fact that we shut down Tomlinson, Portis, and Barber. These guys aren't considered "elite rushers"?

Oh, and you'll have to do alot more than this to offend me.

 

[TruBlueCowboy]

I don't see how shutting down Alexander would suddenly "prove" anything that hasn't been proven already, considering what we've already done. Our run defense has been sort of like our pass defense, or our defense in general. We've shown we're capable of completely shutting down quality competition. But at times (as with any defense) we can make mediocre competition look great.

We essentially shut down Tomlinson, Portis, Westbrook and Barber, but we let LaMont Jordan and Kevan Barlow/Frank Gore have big games. We shut down Randy Moss, Terrell Owens and Plaxico Burress, but we let Brandon Lloyd and Keenan McCardell have big games. We shut down Philly's offense and the Giants' offense, but we let San Francisco put up 24 offensive points.

Let's say we hold Alexander to 19 carries for 76 yards and one touchdown, and we win 24-20. Does that mean we won't let Marcel Shipp run for 100 yards the next week? Of course not.

The problem I have is with the statement that we haven't played an "elite running team." We have, and we basically shut it down.

Here's the thing. We didn't shut down Barber. He was averaging close to his season average that game. When I recall the game, I remember Barber scaring me, but for some reason they kept passing. He averaged 4.6 yards a carry in the game last sunday, which was better than his 4.5 average for the season. AND this was with his longest run only 9 yards which means the stats didn't get blurred as much because of a freak long run. The problem was they didn't use him enough. He only ran 14 times and was limited because of the health issues and over confidence in the passing game which until last Sunday was looking pretty darn good.

Portis is a great tailback but not what I would consider elite. I know Commanders fans want to think that after trading away their best corner and a 2nd round draft pick, but the guy has yet to match his success in Denver -- the infamous offense that 'produces' running back -- and he couldn't even run for over 4 yards a carry last season.

As far as LT, I can't argue against that, he's one of the best. All I can say is if you've watched recent Chargers games, that team is SO MUCH BETTER than they were when we played them very early in the season. We were darn lucky to scrape by with that one before the Chargers starting picking up where they left off last season. LT only ran 19 freaking times!

I wouldn't consider Westbrook an elite runner either. The Cowboys were so scared of him, they played the nickel defense even before they had a big lead.

I'm not saying our defense is fake at all. I'm saying that they haven't been faced with a true test of the running game yet. I'm not talking just the running backs either, I'm talking about big bruising offensive lines that can mow over dlines. I'm talking lines like Seattle where Walter Jones and Steve Hutchinson come headed for your butt, just like the Raiders offensive line that allowed Lamont Jordan to run all over us. I know the Cowboys are young and will make mistakes but unless our offense jumps out to an early lead, I say they get their best test this year against the run and if they pass it, this defense has the potential to be the best in the league.

 

[mr.jameswoods]

First I must say Great post.

I agree with you wholeheartedly. I think Dallas or Seattle, one of these two teams is arguably the best in the NFC right now. I think if Dallas can beat Seattle, that is really going to send a message that we are arguably the best team in the NFC. I'm still not convinced by Tampa since they haven't really played anyone.

 

[JohnsKey19]

When the defense has gone into games this year with the #1 objective to stop the run, we've done a very good job there. We essentially shut down or limited Portis, LT and Barber. The two teams that hurt us with the run were the teams we least expected. There's no way we overlook Alexander like we did Lamont Jordan and San Fran's RBs.

Even last year with our defense a mess, we held Alexander under his averages and I believe he got over 1/3 of his yards on a 4th and 1 run in the fourth quarter. This year our defense is much improved and they're missing their top WRs. Take nothing away from Alexander and Seattle, they're a formidable challenge. I just like the way we seem to match up against them.

 

[Future]

anybody think we will go a lot more 4-3 against seattle to stop the run?

 

[DallasDomination]

what are you talking about?

LT
Portis
Tiki
hyped up Jordan

We played some good backs.....Alexander is just another RB down the list.

 

[AdamJT13]

Here's the thing. We didn't shut down Barber. He was averaging close to his season average that game. When I recall the game, I remember Barber scaring me, but for some reason they kept passing. He averaged 4.6 yards a carry in the game last sunday, which was better than his 4.5 average for the season. AND this was with his longest run only 9 yards which means the stats didn't get blurred as much because of a freak long run. The problem was they didn't use him enough. He only ran 14 times and was limited because of the health issues and over confidence in the passing game which until last Sunday was looking pretty darn good.

Barber was a nonfactor in the game. The Giants started three drives inside our 40, and Barber had five carries for 17 yards on those drives. He didn't make a single big play (his longest run was 9 yards, his only catch was for 5). If we didn't shut him down, we certainly kept him from having ANY positive effect for the Giants.

Portis is a great tailback but not what I would consider elite.

Your personal rankings aside, we held Portis to about half his average yardage this season (52 yards against us, 98.0 in his other games). And we held him to his lowest per-carry average by more than half a yard per carry.

As far as LT, I can't argue against that, he's one of the best. All I can say is if you've watched recent Chargers games, that team is SO MUCH BETTER than they were when we played them very early in the season. We were darn lucky to scrape by with that one before the Chargers starting picking up where they left off last season.

And our defense isn't better than it was early in the season?

LT only ran 19 freaking times!

That's not unusual for Tomlinson. He had 19 against us, 19 aganst Denver, 18 against Pittsburgh and a whopping 21 against the Gaints (when he rushed for 192 yards). If you go back throughout his career, Tomlinson has had 20 carries or less in almost HALF of his games and only 21 or 22 carries in many more.

I wouldn't consider Westbrook an elite runner either. The Cowboys were so scared of him, they played the nickel defense even before they had a big lead.

Westbrook (a Pro Bowl running back last year) against a nickel defense typically averages about 5 yards per carry and breaks some long runs. Against us, he averaged 2.0 YPC, and his longest run was 3 yards.

I'm not saying our defense is fake at all. I'm saying that they haven't been faced with a true test of the running game yet.

Apparently, most of us disagree.

 

[Cowchips]

Yes..how could we consider San Diego's Ladanian Tomlinson elite. How silly of us He is only the best running back in the league !!!

 

[dargonking999]

anybody think we will go a lot more 4-3 against seattle to stop the run?

No, i think we will play 3-4 our base defense. Thats what Roy is for.

Seattle, might be down two WR, and with Ware, and the rest of the DL in the face of Hassleback,i really dont see Henry and Newman needing much help, which means Roy can come crash Alexanders party, and we cans top seeing these stats comparing him to these all time greats. (which he isnt)

 

[Nors]

Its going to be 3-4 base and some aggressive blitz packages. This is a very good offense. I like our chances if we can get to Hasselhoff

 

[junk]

anybody think we will go a lot more 4-3 against seattle to stop the run?

We haven't played a pure 4-3 all season that I have seen.

Some 4-3 over/under perhaps if Alexander gets going. Extra beef up front.

Maybe some nickel, but probably not as much since Seattle's WRs are dinged up.