RECAP: Mickey's Ranch Report on Dunham and Miller

[Stash]

You dont have to buy it if you dont want to, but it was a major factor...Romo was never right after the Cardinals game, thats a majority of the season. Adams wasnt right all yr, Kosier hardly played, we traded for RW and he was never close to 100%, Witten played through some major injuries all season. Felix Jones played a quarter of the season. Barber got hurt in late November and was never the same again.

It isnt an excuse, its a fact.

It absolutely is an excuse, and a poor one at that.

Funny how this team did just fine against the league's poorer defenses despite 'injury'.

Romo seemed just fine in carving up San Francisco and Seattle - both after the Cardinals game.

He also played well against the Giants - also after the Cardinals game.

Funny how Romo's 'injury struggles' happen when he faces top defenses?

Roy Williams himself said injury wasn't a factor for his lack of production, but instead pointed toward 'the Golden Child' for the problem.

Felix Jones wasn't much of a factor considering he missed the majority of the season.

And Tashard Choice did just fine filling in for Jones and Barber so running back injury isn't a valid excuse either.

Injuries played a small part but not enough to excuse the real problem in the games that Romo played.

When he didn't, the backup quarterbacks were simply incapable of playing.

But there's no injury excuses after he was back.

 

[Idgit]

It absolutely is an excuse, and a poor one at that.

Funny how this team did just fine against the league's poorer defenses despite 'injury'.

Romo seemed just fine in carving up San Francisco and Seattle - both after the Cardinals game.

He also played well against the Giants - also after the Cardinals game.

Funny how Romo's 'injury struggles' happen when he faces top defenses?

Roy Williams himself said injury wasn't a factor for his lack of production, but instead pointed toward 'the Golden Child' for the problem.

Felix Jones wasn't much of a factor considering he missed the majority of the season.

And Tashard Choice did just fine filling in for Jones and Barber so running back injury isn't a valid excuse either.

Injuries played a small part but not enough to excuse the real problem in the games that Romo played.

When he didn't, the backup quarterbacks were simply incapable of playing.

But there's no injury excuses after he was back.

Injuries aren't excuses for losing games. Both teams get injured and that's part of being a team. Injuries definitely impact a specific player's performance. They're hard to diagnose b/c teams don't report them and smart players won't divulge anything about their extent. You'd have to have been blind not to realize that Romo was hurt at the end of the year. He missed wide open intermediate throws that he made with regularity easy in the season. These things don't show up in stat lines when your WRs make big catches for you and you blow a bad team out.

And it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why an injured QB's ability to make plays are limited by the league's best 4-5 defenses when it's not by some of its worst.

 

[TheDude]

Injuries aren't excuses for losing games. Both teams get injured and that's part of being a team. Injuries definitely impact a specific player's performance. They're hard to diagnose b/c teams don't report them and smart players won't divulge anything about their extent. You'd have to have been blind not to realize that Romo was hurt at the end of the year. He missed wide open intermediate throws that he made with regularity easy in the season. These things don't show up in stat lines when your WRs make big catches for you and you blow a bad team out.

And it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why an injured QB's ability to make plays are limited by the league's best 4-5 defenses when it's not by some of its worst.

I think Romo's back was pretty hurt. That will affect the way you throw. But I look at it this way, if he was hurt he should not have been trying to over do it and go for the big play (INTs to Ed Reed). He should have manage the game better, but he tried to do what he couldn't do.

I will agree that injuries are an excuse, but a team should be able to coach and game plan around injuries. It just seemed that in game adjustments were horrific this year.

 

[burmafrd]

There are some injuries that you cannot game plan around. When your O line tanks completely- not much you can do about that. Romo being out and the backups stinking it up- not much game planning will do there.
BUT it was also clear that adjustments were rarely made during games and that is the mark of a bad staff.

 

[Idgit]

I think Romo's back was pretty hurt. That will affect the way you throw. But I look at it this way, if he was hurt he should not have been trying to over do it and go for the big play (INTs to Ed Reed). He should have manage the game better, but he tried to do what he couldn't do.

I will agree that injuries are an excuse, but a team should be able to coach and game plan around injuries. It just seemed that in game adjustments were horrific this year.

I'll agree with this. But then, what we're saying is Romo didn't understand his own limitations when he was hurt and the team paid the price for it. That's a flaw in his game I can live with, and I think it's a reasonable criticism. The first pick in the Baltimore game where he under threw Roy into double coverage was a good example of this.

Though, if that's the flaw we're talking about, I don't understand the gnashing of teeth over Tony Romo at QB. There are worse things than QBs who try to do too much when they're hurt to worry about right now.

 

[Idgit]

There are some injuries that you cannot game plan around. When your O line tanks completely- not much you can do about that. Romo being out and the backups stinking it up- not much game planning will do there.
BUT it was also clear that adjustments were rarely made during games and that is the mark of a bad staff.

Yep. And honestly, I don't understand what the problems were with the adjustments on offense. We were, what, 2-6 when tied or trailing at halftime? I refuse to believe that Sparano was the genius behind all the adjustments in 2007.

I don't have stats for it, but it sure seemed we were in shotgun a lot on 3rd downs after Romo came back. And then Mick says yesterday that there were problems with TO's cuts on slant routes (first I'd heard of this all year, too). I wonder if we weren't compromised in some way in adjusting offensively, but that's such a cop-out. It just doesn't make any sense, and I feel like there's an explanation someplace we haven't gotten yet. It really hurt us in the Baltimore game, and in Wash I.

 

[TheDude]

I'll agree with this. But then, what we're saying is Romo didn't understand his own limitations when he was hurt and the team paid the price for it. That's a flaw in his game I can live with, and I think it's a reasonable criticism. The first pick in the Baltimore game where he under threw Roy into double coverage was a good example of this.

Though, if that's the flaw we're talking about, I don't understand the gnashing of teeth over Tony Romo at QB. There are worse things than QBs who try to do too much when they're hurt to worry about right now.

The fumbles and decisions are the problems I have. He haaad 3 mire fumbles in 3 less games plus got bailed out by the tuck rule 3 times.

Bad Back or not, you never chuck and duck vs. the Ravens

 

[TheDude]

There are some injuries that you cannot game plan around. When your O line tanks completely- not much you can do about that. Romo being out and the backups stinking it up- not much game planning will do there.
BUT it was also clear that adjustments were rarely made during games and that is the mark of a bad staff.

Except you showed by a good enough evaluator to not haave Proctor and B Johnson on the team.

Holland played well, but it took him 9 weeks to get in?????

 

[Idgit]

The fumbles and decisions are the problems I have. He haaad 3 mire fumbles in 3 less games plus got bailed out by the tuck rule 3 times.

Bad Back or not, you never chuck and duck vs. the Ravens

The fumbles just killed us. But they're a lot like TOs drops the year he broke his hand. You can't blame a guy for being limited with his hands when there's a broken bone involved. Fumbles will always be a problem with Tony, who puts himself at jeopardy by buying time to make plays, but last year's rate probably isn't indicative of what we should expect from him.

The tucks were actually evidence of good coaching and smart play in my book. They were clearly intentional, so he's taking advantage of the cover that [stupid] rule provides.

The chuck and duck against the Ravens is a throw he'd normally complete, and it would have scored. I'd have no problem with it if it were his first read. I'm not sure it was, though. But that's one of the plays in particular that makes me think either his back or his ribs were worse than we believed at the time.

 

[wileedog]

He also played well against the Giants - also after the Cardinals game..

Wasn't it that Giants game though when his back got hammered?

Although I think McLovin got it right - if he couldn't play 100% he shouldn't have been trying half the stuff he tried, and for the love of Tom Landry Garrett needed to stop calling 7 step drops and run the dang ball.

45 passes against the Ravens with a beat up QB and Oline playing terrible is just stupid.

 

[Idgit]

Wasn't it that Giants game though when his back got hammered?

Although I think McLovin got it right - if he couldn't play 100% he shouldn't have been trying half the stuff he tried, and for the love of Tom Landry Garrett needed to stop calling 7 step drops and run the dang ball.

45 passes against the Ravens with a beat up QB and Oline playing terrible is just stupid.

For most plays, Romo checks the calls at the line and can audible to another pass play or to a run. So not all of the play calling responsibility is on Garrett. Also the offense is predicated on being able to exploit the defensive set and a lot of teams setup to stop the run. So it's not surprise that we threw more often than we ran. We just didn't execute like we had been when we were throwing.

The problem with the Ravens game was that we didn't adjust our protection and really spread them out and let Romo make the free man miss until the end of the third quarter. Even so, if not for the blown tackles, the offense was in good position to win that game right at the end.