Reality
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It was the first pre-season game. I guess in a way, we all expected the team to come out and dominate some aspect of the game. However, you have to keep several things in mind before reacting to the results last night.
The most important thing to realize is that the Cowboys played a soft zone defense. There is no way they will consistently do that in real games given the talent they have at the defensive back position. We can speculate all day that it was to "not give away secrets" due to playing them in a future game, but the reality is that Parcells wanted to see how good his defensive pass rush was and there was no way he could get an accurate assessment of those players if the receivers were being shadowed closely.
Another important aspect is that the Cardinals offensive play calling was designed based on the Cowboys defense. In other words, they were attacking the defensive weaknesses (aka: true play calling) while the Cowboys were playing a soft zone. On the other side, the Cowboys were calling plays to test players and quarterbacks and it made no difference what defense the Cardinals were using each time.
The offensive line had not played together in that line-up so it will take a little time for the players to get a feel for each other's tendencies.
The defense was rushing 5 players on the line just about every single play the first strings were in.
Say what you want about the offensive line, but Bledsoe had "happy feet" every single play. I wasn't worried about completions last night .. I just wanted to see a quarterback who was confident even when rushed. Bledsoe was the only one of the three who was not.
Romo and Henson both impressed me last night. Romo's touch is nice but against first team defenses, the little floating throws he made will be intercepted excluding of course the awesome pass he made over the shoulder of a running Witten.
Henson didn't look like a deer-in-headlights for the first time. He looked mostly comfortable and didn't seem to focus on the pass rush at all. The best quarterbacks are always focused on their receiving targets and move away from the rush based on "feel" not direct visual contact (like Bledsoe did last night).
And the last thing to keep in mind .. just because a player was first, second, third, etc. string last night does not mean that's where they will be when the season starts. I believe Parcells spread the players out better so each string on the field would be somewhat competitive rather than getting to the third string and putting together a team of your worst players.
Then again, this is just my opinion
-Reality
The most important thing to realize is that the Cowboys played a soft zone defense. There is no way they will consistently do that in real games given the talent they have at the defensive back position. We can speculate all day that it was to "not give away secrets" due to playing them in a future game, but the reality is that Parcells wanted to see how good his defensive pass rush was and there was no way he could get an accurate assessment of those players if the receivers were being shadowed closely.
Another important aspect is that the Cardinals offensive play calling was designed based on the Cowboys defense. In other words, they were attacking the defensive weaknesses (aka: true play calling) while the Cowboys were playing a soft zone. On the other side, the Cowboys were calling plays to test players and quarterbacks and it made no difference what defense the Cardinals were using each time.
The offensive line had not played together in that line-up so it will take a little time for the players to get a feel for each other's tendencies.
The defense was rushing 5 players on the line just about every single play the first strings were in.
Say what you want about the offensive line, but Bledsoe had "happy feet" every single play. I wasn't worried about completions last night .. I just wanted to see a quarterback who was confident even when rushed. Bledsoe was the only one of the three who was not.
Romo and Henson both impressed me last night. Romo's touch is nice but against first team defenses, the little floating throws he made will be intercepted excluding of course the awesome pass he made over the shoulder of a running Witten.
Henson didn't look like a deer-in-headlights for the first time. He looked mostly comfortable and didn't seem to focus on the pass rush at all. The best quarterbacks are always focused on their receiving targets and move away from the rush based on "feel" not direct visual contact (like Bledsoe did last night).
And the last thing to keep in mind .. just because a player was first, second, third, etc. string last night does not mean that's where they will be when the season starts. I believe Parcells spread the players out better so each string on the field would be somewhat competitive rather than getting to the third string and putting together a team of your worst players.
Then again, this is just my opinion
-Reality
