More than anything else, what Jason Garrett is trying to do with this team is to re-create the Jimmy Johnson era. And who doesn't want that? In the 1990s the Cowboys ground their opponents into dust with straightforward game plans and overpowering talent, winning games with the kind of tragic inevitability we normally associate with geological disasters. Garrett ultimately dumped the 3-4 of the Parcells and Philips eras for the old 4-3 defense, they run the same basic Air Coryell offense that Norv did (with some odd tweaks to account for the new guy's legs), and they sank a ton of capital into assembling an elite offensive line and every-down running backs.
However, this was actually a terrible idea that was doomed to fail, on multiple levels.
- You can't build a team like Jimmy did anymore. The emergence of free agency and the salary cap makes it impossible to stockpile teams like they did in 1992-1996 where you have stars all over the roster AND great depth behind them. At best what the Cowboys have done lately is assemble a brittle structure with some big names on the top, but nothing behind them but pure scrubs, so any key injuries just ruin entire units of the team overnight. The best you can do now is build teams that deep in complementary parts, with a coaching staff that is skilled in shuffling them around over the course of a season to keep the unit as a whole operating through the inevitable injuries or suspensions or whatever.
- Because of #1, you can't just get by on running old timey schemes and win by bludgeoning people to death using plays they see coming a mile away. The gap between the best roster and the worst roster is just too small now; now more than ever, the weaker team can beat the stronger team with strategy. Part of Garrett's vision almost seems like an implicit admission of his lack of tactical ability - he wants a team that doesn't require tactical ability to win with. The problem is, like I said, you can't make a team like that anymore. At best, it works in spurts until somebody important gets hurt and the whole thing falls apart.
- Jimmy Johnson was great at coaching "difficult" players into being part of the team; you could even argue he was the first coach who really knew how to get the most out of the "modern" star-athlete type of guys. He did it at the U and he did it in Dallas. Garrett, by contrast, has shown no ability to handle these guys - they just become locker room cancers he has to kick out, like TO and Bennett. Do we really believe Garrett could handle a modern-day Charles Haley type? LOL. This is where the attempts to equate Jimmy delegating duties to his coordinators to what Garrett does crap out - Jimmy was a practical psychologist on a level that Garrett can't sniff. Bennett's Super Bowl ring with the Patriots says "hi" right about now, just to rub it in.
- This 1990s football worldview especially doesn't mesh with the guys he has taking the place of the triplets. Dez is supposed to be his Irvin, but Dez is already in decline. Zeke isn't even playing. Dak is good enough to be the QB of the future, but he's also such a different kind of player from Aikman that the Air Coryell playbook should probably just be burned. Whatever Andy Reid's faults, if you put Dak on the Chiefs running that crazy WCO/spread option/wacky motion/whatever offense instead of Alex Smith he probably has 5,000 combined yards by the end of the year. Instead he's trying to throw jump balls to a declining player running a telegraphed route combination that belongs in a museum, and we're mad he doesn't look like Drew Brees doing it.
The free agency comment #1 is bogus. There are teams who have talent on the bench that come in and perform. We all have watched the Patriots wheel and deal and they always seem to have multiple picks in rounds. They somehow have the players that can perform. Surely Brady makes the difference. Also Belichick. But that front office churns not only the bottom but the rest of the roster. They move people before they get old, except Brady. So if they can do that, then the free agency argument is wrong.
#2 If anything, this is an every evolving league. To suggest old timey schemes won't work ignores the transition made by teams using whatever to get the advantage. Used to be the league went with really small receivers. Then they went with big receivers. As one group advances, another is manipulated to counter the first move. This is full contact chess. Surely the passing game is all world right now, but last year Dallas wore people out with the run. The mistake was allowing Ron Leary to walk. Surely the injuries to Smith have made a difference. But that line last year was fearsome and would be this year again if they had kept some consistency.
****There was a lot of crying over the past four years about Free. Collins is not bad, and will be better next season. But Free was better than the great unwashed thought on this site.
#3 Jimmy came to this team from college. He brought his staff with him. The people he hand picked. He had the #1 over-all pick. But Jimmy had an advantage the other coaches did not understand. His coaching staff had scouted so many players during his time at Miami, and they knew the talent crop coming up for several years. That cannot be discounted. People ,point to the Dolphins and suggest Jimmy still didn't have what he had in Dallas. And that is correct to a degree. But he had an old QB and not the draft picks and latitude he had in Dallas because of the primo picks.
I went through Jimmy's coaching tenure in Dallas and researched what he did. I bought one of the Cowboys official books with the current players and information on previous drafts and the history of the team. They come out with one of these every year.
So I laid out all the picks Jimmy had. (This is from memory because I did this in 1996.) Jimmy had a total of 105 picks during his time here. He traded away all but 69 picks in those five years. Out of those 69 picks he hit on roughly 31 of them. But he drafted three hall of famers during that time. His first three drafts were outstanding. Yet if you look down the list, you'll see he flat missed on quite a few players.
He also had the foundation for a great offensive line here. You can sort of recreate this from this site.
http://www.drafthistory.com/
But in all of this. Jimmy perhaps came closest to the Patriots with his way to slide around in the draft and get players his coaching staff was familiar with. He also had luck, although Jimmy hated that word. Jerry called it serendipity. The Emmiitt pick may have been the most fortunate both for Dallas and Emmitt. Dallas was drafting and Jimmy wanted James Francis. Cincinnati took him with the 12th pick. Dallas move to 17 and got Emmitt.
That was a pick that changed the world.
So when you assemble the reasons why Dallas is continually looking like a ship lost at sea most of the time, you have to weigh heavy on the side of the ability to stockpile picks, have a management staff who knows the players, and the nuggs to make those moves and decisions.
But you also need a plan. Perhaps the one thing I agree with is the notion you are somewhat hamstrung by the cap. But still you go back to New England and see they perform at a top level and do so by being very smart about drafting and free agency. So if they can do that, any team can, but needs to assemble the right team.
I agree with #4. But have to wonder if you would have written this if Zeke was here all season and the offensive line didn't have 40% turnover and no real ability to practice and get in sync.
This team is not near as bad as it appears, or as good as it appears when it dominates.
But the one thing that is for certain is this. The defense is better. Regardless of the butt whipping they took the last two weeks. They will show up next season with experience. Maybe some moves to make things a bit better. Hopefully Dallas figures out the defensive line and a linebacker.
But the focal point is scoring, and Dez is no longer a #1 receiver. The real problem here is Jerry is slow to move because he loves his players. And this is the main reason why this team cannot be the Patriots.
