Sturm: The Morning After: Lions 31, Cowboys 30 (4-4)

[WoodysGirl]

In the context of discussing the 2013 Dallas Cowboys, there seems to be two factions of observers throughout the area that the Cowboys call home.

The very large majority seem to consider this team as "the Same Old Cowboys" who can't close the deal on games they should win, often make silly mistakes that make their demise all the easier, and then because of this chronic generosity to their opponent, stay stuck in a rut of mediocrity that keeps them from ever being good enough to contend or bad enough to rebuild. Some weeks it is the quarterback, some weeks it is the coach, and some weeks it is a new player who just joined the team. But, too often there is sabotage that brings an otherwise acceptable performance to its knees at just the wrong time.

And then there is a much smaller group that believes that this season is different from all of the others; and that progress is being made under Jason Garrett and lessons are being learned. They believe that to paint all Cowboys teams of the last decade with the same brush is lazy and reckless and misses out on the nuance of growth and maturity. This group believes that with the help of a personnel department that has found its footing, the turnover in this squad is such that this is a completely new group that is capable of new and lofty destinations and is not at all tied to teams that insist on self-inflicted torture that will in the end leave them stuck in the middle of mediocrity.

But, unfortunately for the particular group that attempts to perceive that organizational progress is being made, there are days like yesterday in Detroit that put far more people in the larger group.

Read the rest: http://sturminator.blogspot.com/2013/10/the-morning-after-lions-31-cowboys-30-4.html

 

[DCBoysfan]

He makes alot of good points.

 

[perrykemp]

I don't always agree with him, however, I believe Sturm is one of the top 5 NFL writers in the business today. The second I see someone post one of his updates I am glued to it until I have finished because I have such mad respect for the man.

 

[Idgit]

He's right that the right move was to run the ball each time on that series, and that the holding call was intolerable. I disagree that playing for fg range was a mistake there. That extra three points on the road in that situation was important. It meant DET needed 7, and if your kicker is money and you can put them in that position, you do it.

The holding call on a running play in that situation was unacceptable. That should have been obvious, and it should have been communicated, and it's on the offensive coaches, but it's not a problem with the play calling.

 

[tecolote]

This sums up the last 3 years for me:

In this particular case, with Detroit holding 2 timeouts when you stop them at 1:24 to play, I am having a hard time seeing a scenario where this loss isn't placed heavily on Garrett fully grasping the percentages of how to close the deal.

What a shame.

 

[Future]

This sums up the last 3 years for me:

What a shame.

I agree that JG screwed up, but if he had just run the ball, not gotten a first down, and then they scored anyways, it would be "JG screwed up by getting too conservative."

Either way, the defense had to make a freaking stop.

 

[tecolote]

I agree that JG screwed up, but if he had just run the ball, not gotten a first down, and then they scored anyways, it would be "JG screwed up by getting too conservative."

Either way, the defense had to make a freaking stop.

I agree about the defense, but what frustrates me is that, with Garrett, we almost always end up on the wrong side in these situations.

 

[ScipioCowboy]

Sunday's game marked Garrett's 24th as head coach. That's three full seasons. And he's still making mistakes like this?

It's just not defensible.

 

[LucaBrasi]

Sturm is so good. for the life of me I couldnt figure out how the Head Coach could talk about "getting the fg" as a priority yesterday when the only priority was killing clock on that final possession. I was listening to the game on XM because my daughter had a swim meet up near Niagara Falls, and we were on our way home. Once the 1st 2 running plays lost yardage, and more importantly once the Lions had burned all timeouts, if the Head Coach simply instructs the QB to kneel down on 3rd down, its likely the Cowboys are punting from their 38 yard line or so with :40 ticks left. If the punt is out of the end zone, the Lions have roughly :35 seconds to go 45 yards for a tying fg attempt. If the ball is fair caught on the punt, they are likely inside the 20 yardline with probably the same time left and even more yards needed for the fg attempt. The last scenario would leave the punt returner not being able to get the ball and the Cowboys allowing precious seconds tick off before likely downing it inside the 10.

The most absurd thing was that the head coach never presented this as a plausible scenario. It was like he never even thought that was an option. He kept talking about trying to get that fg at the end. He should have been fired on the spot.

 

[Idgit]

Sunday's game marked Garrett's 24th as head coach. That's three full seasons. And he's still making mistakes like this?

It's just not defensible.

What's the mistake here, though? You referring to playing for the fg? You really have a problem with that, the way our defense was giving up chunks of yards? I'd much rather have them with 20 s and needing 7 than 20 s and needing three. With Bailey inside 50, and our secondary playing so many replacement players, that extra 3 points was pretty important, in my opinion. I'm surprised so many don't think it was.

The holding call just cannot happen in that situation. That's on the player, the OL coaches, and the HC. But that's a lesser, more-generic reflection of the ship Jason runs and not the full-fledged dumping on this game management that he seems to be getting, instead.

 

[TNCowboy]

He's right that the right move was to run the ball each time on that series, and that the holding call was intolerable. I disagree that playing for fg range was a mistake there. That extra three points on the road in that situation was important. It meant DET needed 7, and if your kicker is money and you can put them in that position, you do it.

The holding call on a running play in that situation was unacceptable. That should have been obvious, and it should have been communicated, and it's on the offensive coaches, but it's not a problem with the play calling.

I would mostly agree. I don't fault the playcalling. You run it 3 times and try to get a 1st down, but as Sturm said, "Tyron made a blunder that simply cannot be made."

But the offense shouldn't have been concerend about the FG. The clock was the thing. If they have to punt, so be it. Detroit is backed up somewhere between the goal line and the 20, needing 50 or so yds with no timeouts and 20-25 seconds. At that point, only an egregious mistake similar to Smith's could lose the game. Ultimately, the players make a mistake like that, you have to look to the coach as well as the player. The goal of the offense had to be to keep the clock moving, more important than position for a FG, and the only way they could fail was a penalty or fumble. As usual, they found a way to lose.

That we've been watching this sort of thing for years is symptomatic of our head coach, and by extension, his boss.

I don't know how anyone can read Sturms column, disagree with it, and at the same time not acknowledge that what we have in Dallas doesn't work and that major changes are needed throughout.

 

[Idgit]

Sturm is so good. for the life of me I couldnt figure out how the Head Coach could talk about "getting the fg" as a priority yesterday when the only priority was killing clock on that final possession. I was listening to the game on XM because my daughter had a swim meet up near Niagara Falls, and we were on our way home. Once the 1st 2 running plays lost yardage, and more importantly once the Lions had burned all timeouts, if the Head Coach simply instructs the QB to kneel down on 3rd down, its likely the Cowboys are punting from their 38 yard line or so with :40 ticks left. If the punt is out of the end zone, the Lions have roughly :35 seconds to go 45 yards for a tying fg attempt. If the ball is fair caught on the punt, they are likely inside the 20 yardline with probably the same time left and even more yards needed for the fg attempt. The last scenario would leave the punt returner not being able to get the ball and the Cowboys allowing precious seconds tick off before likely downing it inside the 10.

The most absurd thing was that the head coach never presented this as a plausible scenario. It was like he never even thought that was an option. He kept talking about trying to get that fg at the end. He should have been fired on the spot.

I obviously completely disagree with this approach, for the reasons I stated above, but I do also completely understand playing it that way. It's a judgement call as to what you're more comfortable with.
What I don't understand is people not seeing the logic behind playing for the fg in that situation on the road, too. You might not agree with it, but it's not exactly crazy-talk to think that's the way to go there. It's perfectly reasonable, and, in my opinion, it's only because we got the penalty, and then gave up 7 points to a team with no time outs in less than a minute that it's even getting second-guessed.

I'd say it's a near certainty that, had Garrett done exactly what you're suggesting, and we'd given up either 3 or 7 in the time the Lions had left (they did score that last 7 in 49 s), JG would be getting crucified for not playing for the field goal or not trying to convert through the air on our last offensive series and people would be calling for his immediate resignation on those grounds. Do you really believe they wouldn't be?

 

[ScipioCowboy]

What's the mistake here, though? You referring to playing for the fg? You really have a problem with that, the way our defense was giving up chunks of yards? I'd much rather have them with 20 s and needing 7 than 20 s and needing three. With Bailey inside 50, and our secondary playing so many replacement players, that extra 3 points was pretty important, in my opinion. I'm surprised so many don't think it was.

The holding call just cannot happen in that situation. That's on the player, the OL coaches, and the HC. But that's a lesser, more-generic reflection of the ship Jason runs and not the full-fledged dumping on this game management that he seems to be getting, instead.

As Sturm points out, if you kneel down on third down, you leave Detroit 20 seconds to get down field after a punt. Football is a game of situations and percentages, and Garrett doesn't know how to play them.

Look, I understand the need to circle the wagons. I really do. We like our team and want to defend them. I get it. But there comes a time when suffering numerous improbable losses reflects on your ability as a head coach.

 

[Idgit]

I would mostly agree. I don't fault the playcalling. You run it 3 times and try to get a 1st down, but as Sturm said, "Tyron made a blunder that simply cannot be made."

But the offense shouldn't have been concerend about the FG. The clock was the thing. If they have to punt, so be it. Detroit is backed up somewhere between the goal line and the 20, needing 50 or so yds with no timeouts and 20-25 seconds. At that point, only an egregious mistake similar to Smith's could lose the game. Ultimately, the players make a mistake like that, you have to look to the coach as well as the player. The goal of the offense had to be to keep the clock moving, more important than position for a FG, and the only way they could fail was a penalty or fumble. As usual, they found a way to lose.

That we've been watching this sort of thing for years is symptomatic of our head coach, and by extension, his boss.

I don't know how anyone can read Sturms column, disagree with it, and at the same time not acknowledge that what we have in Dallas doesn't work and that major changes are needed throughout.

But remember, they scored 7 on that defense in 49 s and no timeouts, as it was. Had they only needed 3 to tie, they could have done that in even less time.

 

[Idgit]

As Sturm points out, if you kneel down on third down, you leave Detroit 20 seconds to get down field after a punt. Football is a game of situations and percentages, and Garrett doesn't know how to play them.

Look, I understand the need to circle the wagons. I really do. We like our team and want to defend them. I get it. But there comes a time when suffering numerous improbable losses reflects on your ability as a head coach.

Nobody's circling wagons. It's a good conversation about strategy. How many seconds do you think it'd have taken them to get into fg range on their last series yesterday in that situation? What was it, two passes to get down deep in their td drive?

Garrett chose between two highly-advantageous situations for the Cowboys yesterday. Either should have put us in the position where a win was very likely. Both were reasonable options. He chose the more-agressive one--and something he's often criticized for not doing on the road, but he was very aggressive with the kicking game yesterday--and we got bit in the throat by a completely unacceptable holding penalty on a running play.

I'll say it again, because people out for JGs blood no matter what will disregard it, but there's no excuse for that happening, and a call like that in that situation is ultimately on the HC. I'm not disputing that, so, please, nobody, insinuate that I'm doing anything but discussing what a team should call in yesterday's situation. But the problem yesterday on that drive was with the unacceptable penalty, and not with the team's late-game management. And that's getting mischaracterized by people who want to spin the narrative to be about play calling again.

 

[Staubacher]

Sturm nails it. Refreshing to see one person in the media blaming Garrett.

 

[LucaBrasi]

I obviously completely disagree with this approach, for the reasons I stated above, but I do also completely understand playing it that way. It's a judgement call as to what you're more comfortable with.
What I don't understand is people not seeing the logic behind playing for the fg in that situation on the road, too. You might not agree with it, but it's not exactly crazy-talk to think that's the way to go there. It's perfectly reasonable, and, in my opinion, it's only because we got the penalty, and then gave up 7 points to a team with no time outs in less than a minute that it's even getting second-guessed.

I'd say it's a near certainty that, had Garrett done exactly what you're suggesting, and we'd given up either 3 or 7 in the time the Lions had left (they did score that last 7 in 49 s), JG would be getting crucified for not playing for the field goal or not trying to convert through the air on our last offensive series and people would be calling for his immediate resignation on those grounds. Do you really believe they wouldn't be?

I respect your opinion here, and getting a 6 point lead and making them score a td is understood. I just felt like the percentages were best bleeding the clock the best way possible and a kneel down at 3rd and 14 accomplishes that with a punt to follow. I never heard the head coach even mention that as a possibility. Like I said, I was listening to the game on the road and I did dvr it and tried to watch it late last night but maybe it was late and I was tired.

As a coach you have to be constantly thinking one step ahead. If you force the Lions to drive a shorter distance for a tying fg then at least your worst case scenario is an overtime. Leaving them even a chance with 1 minute left by calling that running play leaves you a worst case scenario that they ended up with.

This game reminded me of a game in 2002 against San Fran when the great Dave Campo played for a fg and a 6 point lead and the Ninere drove right down the field for the win. That was the death knell for Campo's horrid head coaching career.

 

[alicetooljam]

Now, since the final gun in Tempe at the end of Super Bowl 30, when Jerry and Barry were having a laugh and holding the trophy, the Cowboys are 144-145 in the 289 games (regular season and playoffs combined)

 

[visionary]

Sunday's game marked Garrett's 24th as head coach. That's three full seasons. And he's still making mistakes like this?

It's just not defensible.

agreed

 

[Staubacher]

Garrett loses these last second time/clock battles every time. Every single time.

Remember the Broncos game this year. And two or three games every year.

It's actually amazing how bad he is at closing out games and yet still keeps his job.