Mickey Spagnola is worthless

[Galian Beast]

The problem with Mickey, and I'm guessing many of you is that you don't understand nuance. You see things in black and white.

Did anyone claim that TOP was the only factor in determining wins and losses? No... but in your mind, that's what you hear.

You should work on that.

 

[Blackspider214]

Mick is a company man and a joke. I stopped listening to him a long time ago.

Yep. I remember The Hardline on The Ticket used to hate talking to him, especially Rhyner. He's worthless.

 

[percyhoward]

That pretty much tells me what I feel like I am seeing this year.

How are we doing on this offensively?

We ranked 3rd (.763) going into the Giants game.

http://www.footballoutsiders.com/stats/drivestatsoff2014

The name "DSR" makes it sound complicated, but it's really a very simple stat with a high correlation to wins. It's just the percentage of downs series that result in a first down. So a conversion on 1st or 2nd counts as much as a conversion on 3rd -- as it should.

 

[Wood]

He and Broaddus legitimately don't understand time of possession.

A caller called in and talked about how huge that is for our defense, and Mickey said, it didn't matter, and that both teams have the same amount of possessions...

If you have 20 minutes to score against a team that has 40 minutes to score... Not only does that tire out your defense, but it also quite literally is just less time to attack. TOP matters quite a bit, and is one of the biggest differences in this defense compared to last year.

Mickey tried to say it was 3rd downs on defense, but if you look at the numbers, they aren't far off from last year.

I think Mickey 3rd down was based on cowboys offense this year (which is leading the league at something like 57%) compared to last year where it was much lower like around 27%.

 

[percyhoward]

This defense is by far better than last years defense. I don't care what the numbers say.

The numbers that matter support this point of view. Problem is, most people don't really know which stats correlate to win percentage. Here are four big ones, along with our defensive rank.

Drive Success Rate
2014 4th
2103 32nd

Defensive Pass Rating
2014 12th
2103 26th

Points Allowed per Drive
2014 7th
2103 30th

Takeaways per Drive
2014 9th
2103 11th

You'd rather rank near the top in these categories than in total yards, TOP, or 3rd down conversion percentage, for example. It means you're winning more games.

 

[Sportsbabe]

He and Broaddus legitimately don't understand time of possession.

A caller called in and talked about how huge that is for our defense, and Mickey said, it didn't matter, and that both teams have the same amount of possessions...

If you have 20 minutes to score against a team that has 40 minutes to score... Not only does that tire out your defense, but it also quite literally is just less time to attack. TOP matters quite a bit, and is one of the biggest differences in this defense compared to last year.

Mickey tried to say it was 3rd downs on defense, but if you look at the numbers, they aren't far off from last year.

Thank you.

 

[AdamJT13]

Allowing third-down conversions is one thing, but what really frustrates fans and affects their perception of the defense is allowing third-down conversions on third-and-long. Last year, we ranked 20th defensively on third-and-10 or more, allowing a first down 22.6 percent of the time. This season, we're second best in the league so far, allowing a first down just 13.6 percent of the time (3 of 22).

By the way, our offense this season has converted 47.4 percent of the time on third-and-10 or more, easily No. 1 in the league. And that's despite having the fourth-highest average yards to go on those plays (an average of third-and-14.95 to go). Last year, we ranked 23rd at 19.6 percent, with an average distance to go of 13.67 yards.

 

[Sportsbabe]

He and Broaddus legitimately don't understand time of possession.

A caller called in and talked about how huge that is for our defense, and Mickey said, it didn't matter, and that both teams have the same amount of possessions...

If you have 20 minutes to score against a team that has 40 minutes to score... Not only does that tire out your defense, but it also quite literally is just less time to attack. TOP matters quite a bit, and is one of the biggest differences in this defense compared to last year.

Mickey tried to say it was 3rd downs on defense, but if you look at the numbers, they aren't far off from last year.

Also the less time the opponent has the ball, the clock will likely run out before they can catch up with our offense.

 

[percyhoward]

Also the less time the opponent has the ball, the clock will likely run out before they can catch up with our offense.

Right, but the questions are a) How much of the increase in TOP is attributable to the offense, as opposed to the defense, and b) How much of the defense's performance is attributable to this increase in TOP as opposed to just playing good defense.

 

[Sportsbabe]

He's right in a sense though.

Let's say you score on two 80-yard pass plays, a punt return, and an interception return. That will kill your time of possession, but you'll have 28 points to show for it.

Time of possession means nothing if you don't score touchdowns.

The problem with your argument is the caller, Mickey & I are talking about what IS. You just made something up.

 

[NorTex]

It's all about points per drive. Assuming there are no turnovers and special teams TDs, both teams will have an equal amount of drives.

Also in the Giants game we only ran 1 more offensive play than the Giants. (59 vs 60) TOP was practically meaningless. I suggest that Mick is not worthless and has a valid point. And the opposite is possibly true about the OP.

 

[Sportsbabe]

Right, but the questions are a) How much of the increase in TOP is attributable to the offense, as opposed to the defense, and b) How much of the defense's performance is attributable to this increase in TOP as opposed to just playing good defense.

It's the offense. They are converting 3rd downs off the charts. They are sustaining long drives with time of possession, etc.

 

[maxdallasfan]

Every defense we have faced is bad, so our TOP should be up.

Every offense we faced is bad, so our snap count should be down.

There, it's settled.

 

[MonsterD]

I'd like to see a thread on here that says "The Cowboys logo is a star".

 

[percyhoward]

It's the offense. They are converting 3rd downs off the charts. They are sustaining long drives with time of possession, etc.

It's both. The offense and defense are both in the top 10 in time of possession, and both in the top 5 in first downs per series of downs.

 

[Sportsbabe]

Time of Possession is often over-inflated in terms of importance. But, when a team scores points and wins TOP, now you're talking about a tough team to beat and the TOP being a huge factor.

If you win TOP, but can't score points then the opponent is usually within reach of beating you. But, if you can score a lot of points and win TOP, now the opponent's offense becomes 1-dimensional and they have to throw the ball in order to catch up.

Dallas reminds me a lot of the Broncos Super Bowl winning teams. An aging QB that can't carry the team and they ran the ball with a RB who was gaining yards at a historic rate. The defense wasn't very good, but because they could score points and win TOP, it put them at a considerable advantage.





YR

"..and what the problem is?"

 

[DanteEXT]

Right, but the questions are a) How much of the increase in TOP is attributable to the offense, as opposed to the defense, and b) How much of the defense's performance is attributable to this increase in TOP as opposed to just playing good defense.

Was arguing this at work today. For the Cowboys told it was essentially the only reason the defense was better. For his team the Colts it was just a small part of their better play this season.

 

[percyhoward]

Was arguing this at work today. For the Cowboys told it was essentially the only reason the defense was better. For his team the Colts it was just a small part of their better play this season.

Points allowed per drive.

Cowboys 1.69 (7th)
Colts 1.87 (13th)

 

[Sportsbabe]

The defense is a couple percentage points better than last year and the offense is ~20% better.
Dallas only lost the time of possession battle last year by less than 1 minute per game.

Dallas has been far better about scoring in the red zone and sustaining drives to get to the red zone.

Mickey's point is ultimately correct. You can win time of possession but each team takes turns with the ball so what matter is whether or not you score TDs.
Dallas has been good this year at Scoring 7 to get ahead then being able to milk the clock and get at least 3 to get or extend the lead

So far as I'm concerned, Mickey is wrong. The offense is scoring when they have the ball. He's arguing a point where there is none.

 

[Sportsbabe]

I listened to the episode. Both Mickey and Broaddus said they're still worried about the defense and Broaddus said if Eli would've got the ball back late in the 4th he would drove them down to tie the game and possibly could've won it in OT.

The caller said the defense did enough throughout the game to win it and that you can't use would've should've could've because the Cowboys offense sealed the win. Broaddus said something about not relying on turnovers to win games.

Mickey was taking shots at Sterling Moore saying he's not better than Morris Claiborne and fans need to stop saying Claiborne is a bust. Said Eli went at Moore all day with Ruben Randle.
IMO it Took Eli a tough 4th down TD throw to Beckham just to cut it to 7. I thought the defense played well especially against the run.

Excellent recap.