Yakuza Rich
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Dallas vs. Philadelphia Game Preview
by Yakuza Rich
http://yakuzarich.blogspot.com/
DALLAS (-3) VS. PHILADELPHIA
AT LINCOLN FINANCIAL STADIUM
NOVEMBER 4, 2007 8:15 PM EST
WHEN DALLAS IS ON OFFENSE
After back to back weeks against the Rams and Bills of using a bland scheme and “just out-execute ‘em” approach on offense, Jason Garrett started to scheme up the offense more in order to free up room for Jason Witten and Terrell Owens, two players that defenses have been focusing on.
As I suspected, the Bills game may have been one of the best things for the offense and Tony Romo as he started to look deep a bit too often and the Bills made him pay for it. And as I also suspected, Garrett and Romo would start working on taking the underneath stuff as the Rams and Bills secondaries were playing far off the receivers. Garrett probably felt that the Pats would protect against the deep ball at almost all costs, so the passing game was relegated to taking what the Pats gave them.
In the Vikings game we saw a bit more of a hybrid between attacking deep scheme and taking what was underneath. Early on Garrett used a smart gameplan by using an almost modified version of the old K-Gun offense made famous by the Bills in the Marv Levy era. The Cowboys ran out of a “non-hurry up” no huddle (much like Manning and Brady do) and threw the ball quite often. But in order to make this work, it relies on the offense being able to keep their completion percentage high because that keeps the clock moving and keeps the opposing defense on the field for longer than they would like. Most teams that don’t have Peyton Manning for a Quarterback usually utilize short passing patterns in this no huddle in order to avoid incompletions and stopping the clock. That’s one of the reasons why Thurman Thomas was vital to the Bills offense as he was a great runner and tremendous receiver out of the backfield and could keep the ball moving up the field without it hitting the turf. The Cowboys are not a screen-happy offense, so they relied on the WR’s and TE’s to pull this off and they did as Romo went 31 for 39 and outside of a fumble he had a terrific day. The Vikings best players, defensive tackles Kevin and Pat Williams were almost completely gassed by halftime and Dallas eventually went on to a 24-14 victory.
But while the Cowboys no huddle did revolve around shorter pass patterns, eventually the Vikings started to creep up and Romo started hitting deeper and deeper passes in the first half (he barely threw the ball in the second half). So coming into this game I highly doubt we’ll see a no huddle offense again mainly because the Cowboys are playing on the road, but I believe we will continue to see Dallas “scheme it up” on offense and set up passing plays for the underneath stuff in hopes of eventually opening up the deep ball.
One play I see Dallas utilizing against the Eagles is the weakside counter to the left. Philly defensive end Trent Cole could give Flozell Adams fits as he’s exactly the type of defensive end that Flozell tends to struggle with, a speedster with a good motor. However, Flozell has a big advantage when it comes to run blocking and probably outweighs Cole by at least 80 pounds. The Eagles are an aggressive defense that can over-commit on runs and if the counter gets a step in the wrong direction, Dallas should have a big advantage from there on in. If this counter play works, it would likely force Cole to work on engaging Flozell instead of trying to beat him on the outside edge which would work heavily to the Cowboys’ favor.
While the Eagles and D-Coordinator Jim Johnson always seems to get up for playing Dallas, this is no easy task for Johnson by any means. Johnson likes to have his secondary focus on one main player and I suspect he really believes that taking out Witten is the key to shutting down the Cowboys offense, but he and his team just do not want to allow Terrell Owens to burn them under any circumstance. There’s usually a lot of talk about Owens being overrated, but he draws safety help for most of each game he plays in, so defenses are definitely aware of him and I suspect that Eagles will try and double Owens and just try and keep Witten from getting any deep passes.
Johnson likes to blitz a ton and many of his blitzes will remind you of Wade Phillips’ blitzes. Watching the blitz packages of Johnson and Phillips, they sort of remind me of watching a magician at work. While the audience is drooling over the magician’s pretty assistant, the magician is pulling the rabbit out of the hat with his other arm. So often times you’ll see two linebackers rushing up to the line showing a blitz or a twist and while the offense is paying attention to that, they don’t notice the slot corner coming from the outside edge all the meanwhile the linebackers wind up dropping back in coverage.
One thing I’ve noticed differently about the Eagles defense is their use of the middle linebacker. Johnson must like a middle linebacker that can blitz and drop back in coverage as that pretty much seems to be Omar Gaither’s main duties. Johnson couldn’t do that with Jeremiah Trotter who could blitz, but was slow back in coverage. Gaither is good in coverage, but he’s not the caliber of run defender that Trotter is. Furthermore, I can hardly ever recall Trotter not playing an exceptional game against Dallas, so I’m quite glad he’s in Tampa now.
I think this is a game where Dallas could really use good play from left guard Kyle Kosier. Kosier has struggled the last three games, albeit it’s understandable against the quality D-Lines of the Patriots and the Vikings. That counter play will call for Kosier to effectively negate the opposing Eagles defensive tackle and for years Johnson has effectively attacked the Cowboys passing game by blitzing up the gut.
WHEN DALLAS IS ON DEFENSE
There’s been two main stories to the Eagles offense this year. For starters, Donovan McNabb is not 100% and while he has had a few good games, he’s nowhere near his old form and looks very beatable right now. Secondly, the Eagles wide receivers have been unable to get off the line of scrimmage against corners playing tight coverage.
While the Eagles have had O-Line injuries and injuries to Westbrook, those two factors have easily put the biggest dent in the Eagles offensive effectiveness this season.
The bad news for the Cowboys is that only Newman likes to play tight coverage and can play it well. Reeves and Henry (if he plays) both like to play off the receiver. Andy Reid tried to combat his receivers’ inability to get off the line of scrimmage by using a lot of bunch formations which often force the defense to play off the line and to play zone coverage. It’s worked a little better, but it’s still a struggling offense.
I expect Dallas to try and mix up the coverages here. They’ll probably want to play more man-to-man than they have this year given the Eagles deficiency at receiver. If the Eagles try to go to bunch formations, they’ll probably switch to some Cover 3. In the Parcells era the Cowboys used a lot of 4 across zone against the Eagles as it’s a pretty good defense to protect against quick slants and screen passes to the tailback, two staples of the Philly offense.
I wouldn’t be too surprised to see a lot of inside stunting, perhaps from Greg Ellis and maybe DeMarcus Ware. Watching the Eagles vs. Giants game this year, the Giants D-Coordinator Steve Spagnuolo came up with a terrific game plan by using various blitz packages that could attack the middle and flush McNabb out of the pocket where he’s clearly not comfortable being anymore. Umenyiora’s boatload of sacks made the headlines, but Spagnuolo’s gameplan should have worked even if William Thomas was at left tackle instead of Winston Justice. If they do use linebacker stunts to the inside, I would expect Ellis to see more of them instead of Ware as Ware is just too effective pass rushing on the outside for them to be fooling around with him up the gut.
PREDICTION
It’s November, it’s getting cold, and it’s in Philadelphia versus the Eagles, so I expect a bit of a dogfight. The team still has failed to get off to a good first half on both sides of the ball and on the road that’s a bit more crucial, especially as you get later into the year.
Westbrook will probably be the guy that gives Dallas the most fits and I think the run game has a bit of a resurgence with the probable return of fullback Oliver Hoyte. The Philly defense will be tough, but it won’t be like last year’s Eagles defense versus last year’s Cowboys offense.
Dallas is up by 2 and an Owens touchdown midway through the 4th quarter and a subsequent defensive stop seals it for Dallas.
YR’S PREDICTED SCORE: Dallas 23 Philadelphia 14
by Yakuza Rich
http://yakuzarich.blogspot.com/
DALLAS (-3) VS. PHILADELPHIA
AT LINCOLN FINANCIAL STADIUM
NOVEMBER 4, 2007 8:15 PM EST
WHEN DALLAS IS ON OFFENSE
After back to back weeks against the Rams and Bills of using a bland scheme and “just out-execute ‘em” approach on offense, Jason Garrett started to scheme up the offense more in order to free up room for Jason Witten and Terrell Owens, two players that defenses have been focusing on.
As I suspected, the Bills game may have been one of the best things for the offense and Tony Romo as he started to look deep a bit too often and the Bills made him pay for it. And as I also suspected, Garrett and Romo would start working on taking the underneath stuff as the Rams and Bills secondaries were playing far off the receivers. Garrett probably felt that the Pats would protect against the deep ball at almost all costs, so the passing game was relegated to taking what the Pats gave them.
In the Vikings game we saw a bit more of a hybrid between attacking deep scheme and taking what was underneath. Early on Garrett used a smart gameplan by using an almost modified version of the old K-Gun offense made famous by the Bills in the Marv Levy era. The Cowboys ran out of a “non-hurry up” no huddle (much like Manning and Brady do) and threw the ball quite often. But in order to make this work, it relies on the offense being able to keep their completion percentage high because that keeps the clock moving and keeps the opposing defense on the field for longer than they would like. Most teams that don’t have Peyton Manning for a Quarterback usually utilize short passing patterns in this no huddle in order to avoid incompletions and stopping the clock. That’s one of the reasons why Thurman Thomas was vital to the Bills offense as he was a great runner and tremendous receiver out of the backfield and could keep the ball moving up the field without it hitting the turf. The Cowboys are not a screen-happy offense, so they relied on the WR’s and TE’s to pull this off and they did as Romo went 31 for 39 and outside of a fumble he had a terrific day. The Vikings best players, defensive tackles Kevin and Pat Williams were almost completely gassed by halftime and Dallas eventually went on to a 24-14 victory.
But while the Cowboys no huddle did revolve around shorter pass patterns, eventually the Vikings started to creep up and Romo started hitting deeper and deeper passes in the first half (he barely threw the ball in the second half). So coming into this game I highly doubt we’ll see a no huddle offense again mainly because the Cowboys are playing on the road, but I believe we will continue to see Dallas “scheme it up” on offense and set up passing plays for the underneath stuff in hopes of eventually opening up the deep ball.
One play I see Dallas utilizing against the Eagles is the weakside counter to the left. Philly defensive end Trent Cole could give Flozell Adams fits as he’s exactly the type of defensive end that Flozell tends to struggle with, a speedster with a good motor. However, Flozell has a big advantage when it comes to run blocking and probably outweighs Cole by at least 80 pounds. The Eagles are an aggressive defense that can over-commit on runs and if the counter gets a step in the wrong direction, Dallas should have a big advantage from there on in. If this counter play works, it would likely force Cole to work on engaging Flozell instead of trying to beat him on the outside edge which would work heavily to the Cowboys’ favor.
While the Eagles and D-Coordinator Jim Johnson always seems to get up for playing Dallas, this is no easy task for Johnson by any means. Johnson likes to have his secondary focus on one main player and I suspect he really believes that taking out Witten is the key to shutting down the Cowboys offense, but he and his team just do not want to allow Terrell Owens to burn them under any circumstance. There’s usually a lot of talk about Owens being overrated, but he draws safety help for most of each game he plays in, so defenses are definitely aware of him and I suspect that Eagles will try and double Owens and just try and keep Witten from getting any deep passes.
Johnson likes to blitz a ton and many of his blitzes will remind you of Wade Phillips’ blitzes. Watching the blitz packages of Johnson and Phillips, they sort of remind me of watching a magician at work. While the audience is drooling over the magician’s pretty assistant, the magician is pulling the rabbit out of the hat with his other arm. So often times you’ll see two linebackers rushing up to the line showing a blitz or a twist and while the offense is paying attention to that, they don’t notice the slot corner coming from the outside edge all the meanwhile the linebackers wind up dropping back in coverage.
One thing I’ve noticed differently about the Eagles defense is their use of the middle linebacker. Johnson must like a middle linebacker that can blitz and drop back in coverage as that pretty much seems to be Omar Gaither’s main duties. Johnson couldn’t do that with Jeremiah Trotter who could blitz, but was slow back in coverage. Gaither is good in coverage, but he’s not the caliber of run defender that Trotter is. Furthermore, I can hardly ever recall Trotter not playing an exceptional game against Dallas, so I’m quite glad he’s in Tampa now.
I think this is a game where Dallas could really use good play from left guard Kyle Kosier. Kosier has struggled the last three games, albeit it’s understandable against the quality D-Lines of the Patriots and the Vikings. That counter play will call for Kosier to effectively negate the opposing Eagles defensive tackle and for years Johnson has effectively attacked the Cowboys passing game by blitzing up the gut.
WHEN DALLAS IS ON DEFENSE
There’s been two main stories to the Eagles offense this year. For starters, Donovan McNabb is not 100% and while he has had a few good games, he’s nowhere near his old form and looks very beatable right now. Secondly, the Eagles wide receivers have been unable to get off the line of scrimmage against corners playing tight coverage.
While the Eagles have had O-Line injuries and injuries to Westbrook, those two factors have easily put the biggest dent in the Eagles offensive effectiveness this season.
The bad news for the Cowboys is that only Newman likes to play tight coverage and can play it well. Reeves and Henry (if he plays) both like to play off the receiver. Andy Reid tried to combat his receivers’ inability to get off the line of scrimmage by using a lot of bunch formations which often force the defense to play off the line and to play zone coverage. It’s worked a little better, but it’s still a struggling offense.
I expect Dallas to try and mix up the coverages here. They’ll probably want to play more man-to-man than they have this year given the Eagles deficiency at receiver. If the Eagles try to go to bunch formations, they’ll probably switch to some Cover 3. In the Parcells era the Cowboys used a lot of 4 across zone against the Eagles as it’s a pretty good defense to protect against quick slants and screen passes to the tailback, two staples of the Philly offense.
I wouldn’t be too surprised to see a lot of inside stunting, perhaps from Greg Ellis and maybe DeMarcus Ware. Watching the Eagles vs. Giants game this year, the Giants D-Coordinator Steve Spagnuolo came up with a terrific game plan by using various blitz packages that could attack the middle and flush McNabb out of the pocket where he’s clearly not comfortable being anymore. Umenyiora’s boatload of sacks made the headlines, but Spagnuolo’s gameplan should have worked even if William Thomas was at left tackle instead of Winston Justice. If they do use linebacker stunts to the inside, I would expect Ellis to see more of them instead of Ware as Ware is just too effective pass rushing on the outside for them to be fooling around with him up the gut.
PREDICTION
It’s November, it’s getting cold, and it’s in Philadelphia versus the Eagles, so I expect a bit of a dogfight. The team still has failed to get off to a good first half on both sides of the ball and on the road that’s a bit more crucial, especially as you get later into the year.
Westbrook will probably be the guy that gives Dallas the most fits and I think the run game has a bit of a resurgence with the probable return of fullback Oliver Hoyte. The Philly defense will be tough, but it won’t be like last year’s Eagles defense versus last year’s Cowboys offense.
Dallas is up by 2 and an Owens touchdown midway through the 4th quarter and a subsequent defensive stop seals it for Dallas.
YR’S PREDICTED SCORE: Dallas 23 Philadelphia 14
