Tuesday, September 23, 2008

A look at the Cowboys

Cowboys looked really strong taking apart the Packers. When they played the Eagles and gave up 37 points I was wondering if they could play any defense, but their defense really held the Packers down. They are a real dangerous team with a lot of talent at nearly every position. Then, the Redskins beat them in Dallas and they gave up nearly 400 yards to the Redskins, again giving pause to question their defense. I guess Zorn is a better coach and Campbell a better qb than they looked against Giants in the season opener. Cowboys probably have the most talent on paper, but the main thing the rest of the league has going for it that gives anyone any hope or any chance to beat the Cowboys is the coach, Wade Phillips. My personal opinion is that he is a moron. He has never won a playoff game and he has taken some very talented teams to the playoffs. I am not talking about winning a Superbowl. I'm not talking about winning or even getting to a conference championship game. I'm talking about never winning a single playoff game. He is 0-4 and these teams that he took to the playoffs have a cumulative record of 43-21. That's winning over 2/3 of his games; you would have figured that he would have won one almost by accident in those 4 games, but he is a perfect 0-4.

Actually it goes much deeper than that in evaluating his coaching prowess. I can't remember all of his playoff teams and losses, but I can remember two of them and I think you can pin both of the losses directly on coaching. The one that everyone should remember is the "Music City Miracle", the loss of which can be laid right at the feet of the coaching staff. First, Phillips switched qbs and decided to start Rob Johnson to replace Doug Flutie who had been the starter for the entire regular season. Johnson had a pitiful first half and a weak game, but did lead the team down the field for a FG with 16 seconds left to put the Bills in front 16-15. The only thing to guard against was a run back on the kickoff. The Titans received the kickoff and lateraled the ball all the way across the field to Kevin Dyson who ran untouched down the sideline for the winning TD. That play is 100% coaching. There was no skill, speed, no characteristic you can identify in the players that made this play work other than pure unadulterated coaching. The Titans coaching staff came up with the play and the Bills coaching staff did not figure out how to defend it. I'm not saying the Titans were a bad team - in fact they went to the Superbowl that year. But the Bills had them beaten and they were outcoached to lose this game.

The second playoff game that he lost that he surely should have won is more recent - the playoff game in 2007 with his Cowboys against the Giants. Cowboys were the # 1 seed in the NFC playoffs and were heavily favored. I know the Giants got on one of the great playoff runs of all time and maybe you can't blame this loss on coaching, but I can find a few clear tactical errors that the Cowboys made from a coaching perspective that kept the Giants in the game. First: Cowboys were mauling Giants in first half. They ran the ball a lot and had two long TD drives in first half each of which took 10 minutes. Sounds good, right? However - the Cowboys were not a grind-it-out run-centered offense. They were a high powered, pass oriented offense that led the league in scoring, with passing weapons like TO and Jason Witten and a big time thrower in Tony Romo. So why were they running the ball so much - they should have been passing all over the field and trying to draw the Giants into a shootout. Perhaps more important - the Giants DB-field was all banged up. They had several starting DBs out, and lost one more player, rookie Aaron Ross during the game. Guys that had been on the practice squad the week before were playing prominent roles in the defense. But still, old Wade stuck to a conservative, grind-it-out style instead of the familiar Cowboys air-attack. They even sat down Julius Jones and played Marion Barber at RB the whole game. Barber is a very good player, but he is a power runner, not a breakaway RB. The offensive game plan was flawed. In the 2nd half, the Cowboys OL was tired out from being on the field so much in the 1st half. The Giants DL stayed fresher because of their depth and DL rotation and got after the Cowboys with a pass rush in 2nd half that helped control the game. It is amazing that the high powered Cowboys offense was held to 3 points in the 2nd half, with the weakened secondary that the Giants had playing in the game. Clearly, coaching played a big part in this Cowboys loss.

But for us Giants fans, there's more and it's all about good karma with Phillips coaching the Cowboys. You see - Wade Phillips pappy was one Bum Phillips. Bum was a good old southern boy who coached the Houston Oilers back in the day. He had some good Houston teams who made the playoffs a few times and even went to the conference championship game twice, though they never went to the Superbowl. His best player at the time was RB Earl Campbell who he rode to this good record. Like all good things, this came to an end and Bum was fired from Houston after the 1980 season but was immediately hired to coach and serve as GM of the New Orleans Saints. His first draft was in 1981 and the awful Saints had the first pick in that draft. Having gained much success by riding the powerful running back Campbell to winning seasons in Houston, Bum decided that the way to construct a franchise was to have a great RB as the cornerstone and build around him. Therefore, he took George Rogers, a Gamecock from South Carolina as his first pick. Rogers was a very fine RB and in fact was the Heisman Trophy winner that year. He went on to have a good pro career, leading the league in rushing one year and gaining more that 1,000 yards a few times.

However, the Giants also had an awful year in 1980 and had the second pick in that 1981 draft. When Phillips took Rogers, it meant that one Lawrence Taylor dropped to the Giants, who they took with their 1st round pick. George Young, who had just been selected as GM of the Giants said that he never spent such a sleepless night, that night before the draft fearing that the Saints would take LT. The definition of a "New York minute" is the time between the announcement of Rogers as the Saints pick and the time it took for a Giants representative to run up to the podium and tell commissioner Rozelle that LT was the Giants pick. The rest is history. LT was perhaps the best defensive player in the history of the game and led the Giants to two Superbowls and numerous playoff appearances. Rogers, though a good player, had his career shortened by a knee injury. But he is the answer to a good trivia question. Sam Bowie (and Hakeem Olajuwon) was drafted before Michael Jordan and George Rogers was drafted before LT. Saints never had a winning record under Phillips, but they did go 8-8 one year.

Actually, for true Giants fans, there's a little more karma. The qb on those Bum Phillips Saints was Archie Manning.

'Nuf said.

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