Cowboys Break: What To Do About The Run Game?

The Break. We are live from the s WBC Morgan Studios at the Star. I got David Amber with me. Nick is out today, but we have filled the spot with the Man the Legend. Hey, Jiah, stand back, Colma. Thanks. We give you an opportunity to be a real show. Wow. This bizarre rivalry, a whole bunch of people that work together. Yeah. Yeah, we love having you on the show. I said, I know you and I got a chance to do a show back during the time we mix the shows up

during the bye week. But good to have you back with us. We have a lot of stuff we're gonna talk about today. We're not gonna be joined by Bucky Brooks today. He's gonna join tomorrow and give us his takes on Cowboys versus Giants. We figure because the Giants are so bad, we can figure we put that all into one day. We don't need two shows for that. Say that we have learned a very hard less no no, no, back up, back up. I did not say that because

they're bad doesn't mean that Cowboys can't get beat. What I said was they're bad, and so I think it's pretty clear they're bad. Now we'll see what happens on Sunday what that means to the Cowboys. But they're not a good team. Um. Anyway, we're gonna get to Bucky tomorrow, but today we're gonna talk a little bit about Giants offense versus Cowboys defense. We'll talk a little bit about some other topics. We didn't get a chance to get to what Jerry had to say about Dak Prescott yesterday.

We'll talk about that a little bit today as well. Nick. I'm sorry not Nick day like that real nofense. Nick was about say you might have not not just kind of put him out there. I'm my own man, Okay, you are your own man, Dave, and you're unique man. Give me a seventy nine real quick. I think it's pretty obvious Harvey Martin, and I love Harvey Martin for it's a cool thing about this job. I'm I just turned thirty three yesterday, your birthday. Thanks, you have a

good birthday. I had a great birthday. Awesome. Um. I didn't know anything about Harvey Martin when I started working here. Sorry, Like, I know that sounds blasphemous here, but I didn't. Yeah. He but you work here and you learned the history of the team and you're like, oh my god, this guy was a badass. I was embarrassed when I finally figured out who he was and what he'd done that I'd never heard of the the same. But growing up in Houston,

I'd never really heard. I mean, there's so many legends around this team, you know. I mean, I know, I knew Stabok, I knew Pearson, I knew all the nineties guys. But I just you can't know everybody unless you're like a die hard fan of this team. Super Bowl MVP one hundred and fourteen career sacks. He's I think he's thirty two in career sacks. I don't know if they even tracked him for most I don't think they did. Yeah, Defensive Player of the Year four time for like he

was a legit player at the very least. He's got a ring of honor. What's the word I'm looking for here, he's got a case for it. Yeah, and he probably has a case to be in the Hall of Fame as well. And people don't really talk about him. So shouts out to Harvey Martin seventy nine, no doubt about it. All right, let's jump in. We're going to a first. I wanted to get a cut catch up on a few things. Coach McCarthy just finished talking to the media.

He did say that there were going to be some practice modifications today, Dave, what was he talking about there? I think, and this is the type of thing that happens anyway you get late in the year, like there's

fewer padded practices. Everybody's beat to hell, and I just think they're kind of dialing it back, like this isn't gonna be Some coaches not so much these days because it's in the CBA, But like I was listening to somebody talk about this other the other day, Like some coaches are like, no, we're in pads, no matter what. That's what we're gonna do. But the more and more you get into this and learn about player health and try and keep people healthy, like you dial some of

that stuff back. So I think this will be more than a walkthrough, but not your typical I mean we're not We're not getting after it in pads and hitting each other here. So I just think they're trying to preserve the roster a little bit. I see, how many more years could you have played in league if they let you take the pads off and have these kind of practices. This schedule is just different. I'm still I'm

still back locked into my old school methods. You know, we're out there, you know, three days a week with pads on, and yeah, these guys now they're just running around with with sweatpants on half the time. But is better? Is it better on your body? Yes? On your body? Yes? I mean they I can't I'm not in the locker rooms. I don't know how it's really affecting these guys. I just know that we we were physical. It was a lot more physical back then, and um, it's a lot

more tiki tech now. So I think it kind of offsets each other. Right, the physicality was dependent on you being to go throughout the week, and that carried over into the game. Now these guys aren't allowed to be as physical in the games, and it's kind of showing up on the practice field too. Yeah, I can't remember

when you came in the league. Were we still doing two of the days, because I remember two a days and it was a different kind of training camp because it did it consumed your entire day because even from our standpoint, I mean, you got two practices that you're covering in a single day. It was a lot more different than obviously we weren't on the field having to run around twice a day. But I assume that beat

in season. No, I'm saying during training two a day practices during training camp for that entire four or five weeks that we've been a training camp, and there weren't these built in day off every four days like it is now. Like it was a very very different world.

But they all, I mean, they did the correct me if I'm wrong, Like, not that long ago, it would be normal in December to suit up in full pads and yeah, beat the hell absolutely, especially depending on the organization that you played for you were in New England, was that the most intense that you ever experienced? You were in pads every day, you were in pads. Yeah, absolutely, I mean all way up until you know to Friday practice, which is a jog through. Even then we would probably

still have shows on, you know. So it's just it's just how it's just the culture of the team. You know, it's just a culture team and it's evolved, right These coaches are evolved and they're they're changing. I'm sure you know, coach McCarthy back in the day probably had his guys in pads all the way up into it. But the CBA, you know, a lots for certain certain things that have to change, and this is just one of them. And

the game's changed. Yeah, And it sounds like they've gotten smarter with the use of analytics and the tracking devices they used to they kind of know how much stress each players putting on their body and they know when

it's time to dial them back. I'm not going to go as far as to say it's the only thing he cares about, but Mike McCarthy, like the analytics of his player usage is very important to him, and like he talks about it all the time, Like he's always talking about like the GPS numbers on like how much a guy ran a practice, how fast he was running, how much work he was putting on himself. I think

he studies that stuff religiously. And you hear people talk about the Stay program, which is what they call his the weekly method, where like they don't practice Friday, they do mental health stuff, and it's all more of a mental aspect of it. Like he's big on that stuff and he's talked about it before, like he ran some Green Bay teams into the ground, and this is like the natural learning curve of that. Another question was asked him with regard to the health of the team right now.

There's only really one player, Tyren Smith, that's not practicing at this point, which is remarkable for a team in December, and given the week that we were having around the league right now, no COVID updates either. The only one they got right now, Cedric He's the only one that's on the COVID list. And we're gonna talk a little bit about COVID a little later. I have some questions for you guys on that. But that all being said, I do think there's still kind of dis lingering what's

up with Zeke Kyle is he doing? And he was asked that question, what if McCarthy say on Zeke and kind of what do we feel about where Zeke is at this point? I think Zeke is probably gonna be where he is. I don't. I mean, we talked a lot about let's get to this break after the Saints game, and he did, and he said he felt better. He looked better in Washington. Would y'all agree with that? He

looked better? He didn't look we're qualifying this. He looked better, he looked a little more sprightly, he had a little extra burst. But he's I think he's gonna be banged up until this season is over. If I had to guess, maybe on the outside chance they can earn a bye week that could help out. But I think, and that's kind of what Mike said, is Zeke's fine. I mean, he's not magically one hundred percent and he probably won't be, but he's he's going to continue on this path that

he's been on. I think, Yeah, I'm disappointing. I mentioned this earlier on Talking Cowboys. I'm really disappointed that they missed the opportunity to give him seventeen days off. They had an opportunity to give Zeke seventeen days off a couple weeks ago, and they chose not to, right, and they chose not to and then they brought him into

game and use him for pass protection primarily. So now you you're faced with a situation where you're you need Zeke right, you need the running game because the running game, we're seeing the effect it has on Deck okay, or the lack there of the running game. We need Zeke when we need a most he's not anywhere near healthy. What percentage would you say Zeke is right now? Sixty That's what I said. Yeah, I think Zeke sixty percent.

And I truly believe that the ponent that we're facing this week, there's an opportunity based upon what we saw last week with Clemens. He came out and he was he was shifty, he was explosive, he was he had all the things that you all the makeups of a of a running back that can run in his backfield.

I think there's an opportunity to rest Zeke and Poler this week and get them healthier going into this last stretch and then if you're somehow able to secure the division right and take care of of the Giants and Philly loses, hopefully, then you have another week at the end of the season that you can rest your guys. Right. This isn't about I shouldn't use the word rest, it's I should use the term. You know, she's getting guys healthy.

Zeke is not going to be a huge it's not going to be a contributor to this offense aside from his ability to block, if you don't get him some time off. And I don't necessarily disagree with anything you said, but I've been saying on our show this whole time, like I just don't think you can afford to and it sounds completely unsexy, but like that ability to block is important, Liken. Like, for example, even this bad Giants team, Azizo Glari, they got this rookie edge rusher who's got

eight sacks. He might be the talk of the division if Michael wasn't doing what he's doing. You know, send Corey Clements and Edo Smith up there to keep Dak on his feet. I don't know, man, I don't know about that. I hear you know, and I understand the fear. I understand the fear, but I think that if Kellen Moore is what we say that he is, he can scheme around that. I think it's more important for Zeke to get his rest going into the end of this year than it is for us to sit back there

and utilize him. Fifteen plays out the game for sitting back in pass blocking. If Kelly Moore can't figure out how to block that up without Zeke back there, then we have some bigger issue out Tyrn too, without Tyranto. I mean, but this is why we These guys are professionals. These guys have a job to do, and the giants aren't scary, right. I feel like we're evenly mad against him with our office a line right now. That sounds bad, right,

but that's just the way it is. And the replacement staff we had to put and put in place, but we need Zeke healthy. And we see even with Zeke, would you say that he contributed to last the last two games? Honestly he contributed on Sunday, I don't think it was. I don't think it was to the level where, I mean where without him you would not have been able to That's and that's what I mean. Yeah, I would take one hundred percent healthy Clemens, and I would take a sixty percent Zeke if I know that I

can get Zeke to be a seventy five percent next week. Yeah, And that's what I'm looking at, because right now Zeke was running the ball, he looked better. To your point, he looked better until what he took a shot on his nation and where where do you go? Ben? And that's my problem, that's my problem with all of it is it seems like over the last two or three games they've limited his the amount that they're using him.

But it's always in every one of those games, there's a moment where he takes a hit, and so to me, it kind of restarts the clock on him getting healthier. And so if you're gonna do that, just sit it out and just don't worry about that and let those other guys have to step up and provide would you need for a week or two to give him that

extra ress so that hopefully he's more healthy. Counterpoint, Yeah, if you handle your business against two teams that you're better than, you could have two weeks where he like where they're not meaningless, but like you've done what you need to do, even the Arizona game and especially the Philly game probably, and so, like I keep saying, gut

through it. You should win against New York, you should win against Washington, and then maybe you can make those types of decisions once the playoffs are one hundred percent secured. I don't. I mean, I feel like we tend to overcomplicate things sometimes, and I know it would change the preparation during this week, and he can change and increase potentially an injury depending on how much they use him.

But let's say limited practices goes in, you still have him activated, and then depending on how the game is going, I mean, you decide whether to use him or not. I mean, it's against the Giants, we said that. I think that the Cowboys, and they've shown otherwise sometimes, but I think they should be very capable of handling their business without seek on the offense this week. But if needed in a case of emergency, can't you just have

him there on the sideline ready to go. And I know it doesn't necessarily work that way because you healthwise, you know, there's a certain protocol that you have to go through it with your body to be ready to step into the field. But how how difficult is that really, you know, just having him as a backup there. I will say this, and as you mentioned earlier, give him

in antp some time. But I personally think if you can get Polot back this week, that becomes impetus for me to say, sit Zeke, don't even suit him up, because I look at it and say, I've got I've got Tony Pollot, who I think is running as well at least as well as ze right now. And so I got him, and I got these other supplemental backs that I can use with him, and to me, that should be enough for the running game for for a game,

for a week or two, um. And so if if Poller is ready to come back, I think that's the impetus for me. I don't love the idea of going into a game without either one of them, even against the Giants, just because I do think you want to be able to run a little bit better than what they're going to get out of those guys. But I do think that, you know, if you got Pollard back, that becomes my remason to say do it. That makes sense.

But the reality is Poler's injury that he has right now, that's not going away, right, That's not it's not going away. That plan or fashiout is if anybody who knows and it just where he probably isn't isn't going away either. So that's what I'm saying. But but by going by, continuing to wear on it, it gets worse. Yeah, right, So by giving these guys time off, you're allowing them to you know, it's like a video game, right, you

know what I'm saying. It's like the fishing line. You throw it out there and you know, you get the tension on it and then it eventually he's gonna it's gonna pop. Right, But if you ease up off it, guess what you restore you you know, you're your stre These guys need this break and this built in it's built in. TP is not healthy. And if you wearing out and then you have something that can get substantially worse. Zeke, we see, Zeke is a shadow of himself. And there's

no disrespect to Zeke. He's given it everything that he has. You can there's a lot of guys playing with a lot of injuries right now around this NFL Dallas Cowboys are not, and Zeke is gonna play through this thing if they allow him to sit him down, don't take the decision out of his hand. Sit down. We need you. If there's anybody in the Dallas Cowboy Nation wants to talk about playoffs right now, you need a running game.

And I don't believe that our running game against the Giants is going to be dependent based upon the skill set of the running backs that we have. Is gonna be more based upon the offensive line's ability to create holes. You make a compelling point, my friend, I will I mean, and if you listen to the show, you I'm good at this, Like I can turn the worst team into like a world beater. In my mind, I'm I'm looking

hard to do it is. But if there is a if there's a place where I look at it, I'm like, Okay, there's some there's some guys there. They don't have Leonard Williams. Like that's there, that's the guy you would normally be worried. Yeah, and all that, I mean, Dexter Lawrence is still a good player and he's available, right. Yeah, I get OJILARI. He doesn't. He hadn't. He doesn't have the stats. But Lorenzo Carter has been a pretty decent player for them.

They really like Georgia as rushers for some reason. But I mean, no, you make a compelling point. I mean they're not. I guess the other thing too, is they're not gonna do it. That's that's my big like, Well, that's why you think I'm boring, because I'm just like, why are we talking about this? They're not gonna do It's why we do talk I know, that's why we do talk about you. You're right, so we could talk

about that is that is a compelling point. Although I am I'm still inclined to be like, let's play these games when the East is actually secure instead of definitely or instead of sort of secure. All Right, we're gonna take our break. When we come back, I want to talk about Jerry Jones and some comments he made yesterday. I think they got a little overblown. We'll talk about it when we come right back. This is Dallas Cowboys dot Com Radio at ATNC. Everyone new and existing customers

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eighteenth seventeen. Admission and parking are free. For more information, visit the Star District or dot and there is a chance you're welcome. There is a there is a chance that if you come out here Friday, you might just run into one day at hellman Oh yeah, heading to

his car, I leave, I run into it. I run into somebody damn near every Friday, like I'll walk through the district or maybe I gotta go to the gift shop to pick something up for somebody, and yeah, oh, the gift shop is the place to hang out if you try to just run into people. Yes, that's the place to hang out, because there a bunch of yesterday I was in there and a bunch of people I ran into that work here just in their shopping because it's time of the year. Employees can get a discount.

My friends know that I get a discount. And I'm in there every year at the car, I'm in there every other week, like hey, what my dad needs this, my sister needs this. That was a great perk when I was playing here. You know, take the family and so you get the calls from all family friends, need the Cowboys to quote, give Jerry his money back to quote the great marking, or come see me, check it out, check it out. You're gonna say, Dave's lighting the tree.

David's not this week, not this week, but we're working on it. Maybe the day Dave needs to be getting paid to be here after like three o'clock on a Friday. Yeah, I don't even think that's gonna keep you around. Probably not. Probably they're black on a Friday. All right, let's jump back in. There was some comments that Jerry made yesterday

on one h five Dout three the Fan. He was on with H R, J H and Sean and and here's I'll read to you the quote, and then I want to get some comments from you guys with the guards of what you thought of it when you heard he said, I don't want to say that. He was asked about Dak whether Dak is in a slump He says, I don't want to say that slump up. But that's probably fair. But it's such a multifact evaluation that I would say our offense is definitely away from where we were,

where we were playing five or six games ago. Now I think the narrative that came out of that was Jerry Jones says, Dak Prescott's in a slump. I listened to the interview. I didn't think that's what he was saying. What I thought he was saying was, it's fair for you to say that. I don't want to say slump. But let's just say the offense, because it is a much bigger evaluation than just a quarterback. Let's just say the offense is not playing as it should be playing.

Maybe the offense is in a slump. But I was I don't think he was saying that Dak was necessarily in a slump. What would you guys say? What was your take as you as you heard that quote? It reminded me. Mike McCarthy was asked the same question and he basically said the same thing without his juicy of a sound bite. He was like, I don't believe in slumps as a football thing. Which a slump is. It is baseball hitting, No doubt, you're not hitting well, it's

you basketball, you against the pitcher. Yeah, how you're shooting? And McCarthy he said it on Sunday. He said it a bunch of times He's like, this is the ultimate team sport, this is eleven on eleven. There's a million reasons why these things happen. And I think Jerry was saying the same thing. But yeah, it's fair and obvious to say that Dak is not playing up to his

standard over most of the last five weeks. Fourth quarter against Vegas and I'm drawing in the Atlantic Atlantic the Atlantic game two times out of the last five weeks. He's not even two times one quarter in one game out of the last five weeks, he's been great. Other than that, he's he's been bad. And so, I mean, maybe they don't want to call it a slump, but

we can recognize that. I for the last four four to five weeks, I've been the bad guy around Cowboys Nations saying that Dak is off and Dak, you know, has his mechanics are off, you know, his decision making is off. And everybody's like, oh, you're Dak hater and you're cowboy. No. I call it like I see it. As a former quarterback. I've been noticing these things. His decision making has not been on point. He's been hesitant, he hasn't been he hasn't been more proactive in terms

of across the line of scrimmage for whatever reason. It's like an invisible boundary right there. Ever, since a calf injury, his release point has been off. We saw that with the interception to Collins the other day. Um, he's forcing plays. We saw that in to a couple of plays where he should have been intercepted or the first player's first drive of the game. And also he tried to force a screen pass in there the other day as well that should have been picked off. He's he's in a slump.

He's been in a slump and it's not and it is, you know, to Jerry's point, Jerry's been trying to save him. You know, mister Jones, I respect the crap out of him. But for whatever reason, if you're a bubble I said this other day, if you're a player on the bubble and you make a mistake, you you got to own up to all of it, right you. You might even get fired if you make one big mistake. For whatever reason. The high profile players get grace, They get a ton

of grace, you know. And Daks has been receiving that from mister Jones, from the boss Man and he said, Hey, last time he didn't want to put any responsibility on it's the receiver's fault. And that was last week. It's a receiver's fault. They're not running the route to the right depth. And this week he doesn't want to say that. Dak's into something and he's in a slump. It's okay. It's not a bad word. It's something that as a professional you can take that. You get coached hard every

single day. I'm not playing up to my standard. My mechanics are all, My decision making is off, and my execution is off, and it's affecting everybody around me. Now is it just Dak? Absolutely not okay. The office, the line playing musical chairs, they can't get things going to the left guard position. Teams are picking on our on the Connor bros. And Tyler Beads. That is a gaping hole whenever you're facing. If you're gonna say there's a weak spot on the Dallas offense, that's it, right. And

so Dak I think got pressured. We I think we pressured Washington twenty times. I think we have QB pressure. I think they pressured us thirteen or somewhere around there. So got sacked four times a game, so he's not it's not a clean game. Yeah, it's not a clean game. So he's not able to set his feet back there the way he wants to and regain his confidence that he has lost. So it is multifaceted. But at the end of the day, Dak is in a slump. Yeah.

Being in the slump is way better than saying you suck. So I'll take being you're actually pretty good and you're just not right now. Yeah, So they don't suck and we know they got it. They're just in a slump right now and they need to get out of it. And I think the same can be applied to a bunch of other players on the offense. Maybe not the same level of Dak right now, but you can say that about almost everybody, including these top wide receivers that

we got on the team. Now, another thing I wanted to point out on Monday, it was that we talked about like the mental aspect and like Nate was talking about it, and you know, that's something we can't visually necessarily see, but and I'm not blind. Every week I look for pictures to upload on the side and things like that. I see Dak and like you can tell, if you've been seeing Dak long enough, you can even see it in pictures, how he just looks different, like

his confidence is not there. He's starting to now visually show it on his face. I've seen videos of it. So he's definitely going through something mentally where he's just not as confident. And I'm sure, like what's been happening week after week when you're not being successful, it creates more pressure on you and you start feeling it, you know.

So hopefully this game against the Giants will allow for him to complete plays, go for it, just regain a little bit of the confidence that we know he has and it's there and it's one of the best attributes that he has ever had. He just needs to get it back. And here's the thing, Like, obviously, I know that's your take, and none of us really knows what's going on in his head, because obviously he's the only

one knows what's going on in his head. But I do want to ask you, Isaiah, as a former professional athlete, talk to me a little bit about that mental part of it, what happens. And I don't know if you've been through this, but what happens when you get into that moment where maybe you're doubting your teammates, maybe you're doubting yourself. Maybe there are lingering mental things that you're having to deal with from the injury you're recovering from.

How do you get how do you how do you break through that as a professional athlete on a stage like this where everybody's watching and everybody's looking at you, like, man, you ain't the same, you ain't as good. It's the reason why he gets paid forty a year is because everybody understands the pressures that he's going to be under. Things are going great, it's his fault why things are going great. Um, and he's the reason why when things are bad, you're seeing it. Everybody's pointing a finger at

Dac And yeah, he has to figure things out. And the way in which you do that is Keller Moore has to help him. Keller Moore has to help him. The best officer line has to help him. They have to give him opportunity. The running game is not where it needs to be. The officer line is not where it needs to be. This this team, in terms of their scheme, it feels like Kelly Moore has he's the bag that he was in is empty, right, he needs

to restock that thing. You know, he gave out all the presents and so it's not it's not just Dak and Keller. Moore has to find a way to make these these these concepts a lot easier for him to digest. Okay, teams are growing a lot more too high safety, so it's complicating things in terms of his ability to find windows.

Why are they going too high safety? Well, because the running game is not going Teams would never go too high against this before, right, So it is they're running against a seven man box with you and they're not being able to do it. Do it, can't do it, right, that's the that's the offset. You go too high safety to try to stop the pass, right, you go single highest safety to try to stop the run. And these teams are going too high safety because they're like, you

guys don't have a running game and Dak's struggling. So guess what beat us and you and you're you're not You're unable to the way that you really want to. So he has to build confidence by this by this the concepts he has to build off some confidence by this running game helping him out. And then when you have when you lack confidence, you want to be precise when you've made mistakes. He's throwing what five or six hundred six interceptions in the last six games, I believe.

So when you're when you're making those kind of mistakes, now everything, you're second guessing your throws and your decisions. Now, like for instance, on that screenplay, when he should have threw it, when he should have threw it the zeke, he didn't throw it the zeke. So guess I'm gonna wait for him to come to the next window and I'm gonna make sure that my next pass is on point. And guess what, now it's not. And by the way,

that defender also knows that. So now he's keyed in and just watching like, oh, yeah, throw it now, yeah, throw it now. It's there's this weird thing when you watch him recently where like and I don't maybe he doesn't trust his receiver, maybe he doesn't trust himself. Probably a little bit of both, because he's made some bad throws and there have been some bad drops and things like that. There's it looks like he wants to go and hand it to the receives perfect, you know what

I mean, and he's not. That should be instinctual. You're like, I see you in this window on this look, I'm ripping it and he doesn't look like he trusts himself to rip it almost ever. Yeah, they need to get that back, which I wonder. I know you can't do this for seventy five plays, but I'd like to see

maybe some more tempo. Probably the best drive of that entire game was the two minute they wound up kicking a fuel goal, but they went from probably their own red zone or near it down you know, he had a great completion to Amri over the middle for eighteen twenty yards something like that. They just they looked natural, They looked more like themselves. And whether it's because you're not giving yourself time to think or because the speed of the offense is throwing the defense off, either way,

they look better when they go tempo. They were doing a lot of tempo in the fourth quarter of Vegas because they were trailing. Like I said, I know you can't do that every snap of the game, but maybe try to mix that in a little bit more, just as a way of kickstarting things. People fail. I fail to give credit to the running game on this offense. Everybody wants to point to the skill set that's at

the receiver position. Everybody wants to point to the fact that Dak, you know, start off the year throwing fifty times, and how we can throw it, and Kellen Moore has all these games. This team is built on the run. I don't care what you try to do passing wise, you have to have a running game. And when you don't have a running game, this is a result. I've fought against that for so long because I do think Dak is good enough to carry it when it's not working.

He hasn't been recently, but he's done that before. He did it last season when Ze couldn't stop fumbling like he can carry you. It's still not a good idea, and there's no denying when you go look at it. Their worst rushing performance of that win streak when they were murdering everyone was one twenty two. That was their worst performance. They went to they got to two hundred

against the Chargers. They were going for one forty one, sixty eighty, that type of thing, and I think New Orleans was their best rushing performance since and that was one thirty five, and you got the vast majority of that off of two big chunk players instead of just gradually.

It's important, and like I said, DAK is good enough to carry you without it, but it's not going to be as pretty or as consistent as it is when the run game's humming, and everything that could help your running game all of a sudden at the same time is not working right. Your offensive line isn't doing what they need to do. You've got an injured top running back,

You've got an injured second running back. Your quarterback who usually adds to your rushing total is not willing to run the ball at the same rate that he was before, and maybe not as effective as it was before. So everything that could contribute to your running game, what we've seen this running game be in the past several years, is all broken it all the same time, and so I don't know quite how Kellen is going to be

expected to get that all fixed. But that's the job, right The job is you got to figure out how to get that fixed real quick. Before we end the show, I did want to move on to one more topic that I wanted to hit right now. There is a major outbreak around the NFL with regards to COVID. I want to say the number was at sixty something players over the last two days who have now been placed in the COVID protocol. Dallas miraculously is not in that situation.

They got one player on the COVID list right now. The question for you guys, though, is how capable is Dallas right now to manage an outbreak from the standpoint of their depth. Obviously they're doing everything they can from the standpoint of their protocols, but do you think they have the right depth to be able to handle an outbreak? Because as you get closer to the playoffs and in the playoffs, I guarantee you there are going to be some playoff games this year that will be affected by COVID.

Question will be what teams have the right amount of depth to be able to manage that. I don't think anybody is equipped to handle. I mean, if it's the right outbreak. The Cowboys got. The outbreak that they dealt with was mainly coaches, which that's not great, but you're not losing people that can play you the game. I mean Cleveland on paper, On paper, they have one of

the more talented rosters in the NFL. They got this great old line, they got two of the best running backs in the league, and like they might not be able to field a team because they've lost so many guys. I mean, they lost their quarterback today. If if if Dak catches COVID, god forbid and it. You know, it seems like he and a lot of these other guys are really going out of their way to keep that

from happening. But like, is that the one guy on this team that is the most important guy you couldn't afford to lose. I Ironically, they won a game without him, but I would still say so. I mean, you kind of have a quarterback in this league. But I mean, you know what if this is this is just an example. Please don't kill me for this. But like um, DeMarcus Lawrence, Micah Parsons, Treyvon Digs, and somebody else were hanging out

together watching Monday night football. They tweeting about it, pizza hut all that stuff. They're what if they're all close contacts or transmitted to each other. Again, that's purely hypothetical, but like, you have no idea how this thing can get transmitted, I'm sure this new strain omicron is part of it. I hope I said that right, Yeah, it's I mean, there's there's no rhyme or reason of this. So I don't think any team can can handle it if you draw the wrong break, you know. And I

just saw I think, who did I see on Twitter? Uh? Taught R He was talking about that the possibility of them being in the bubble with the Omni hotel, so going back to how they were last year at times, so they're starting to look at options to make sure it doesn't help. I would check the whole damn team into the Omnis tonight. The challenge with that, though, still is that, you know, even with that, I mean you will you will obviously mitigate your risk because there's less exposure,

but you can't take risk completely away. There's still going to be people that they're around. You know, again, when they on the plane, all of us or some of us are on that plane with them, Like we're not. I'm telling you not right now, I'm not going to stay in the Omni for a month and a half. So so I mean, that's not happening. So and you also got to think about the standpoint two of you want your players to be in the right mental state

as well. So you tell a guy who is a veteran player that has two or three kids that now you're not going to be at home with your family for Christmas. I don't know how I feel about that if I'm a veteran player with that kind of setup, Like, I know, this is my job, but there's certainly also that mental part of it too. Am I creating more mental stress for myself by not being with my kids and my kids not understanding why I can't be with them for Christmas because I'm sitting at a hotel, Like

There's a lot of stuff that goes with that. So it sounds good if you got robots. It doesn't work when you got people actually humans, you know, I think this team is built for it. As long as you don't touch the quarterback in offensive line, I think every other position and linebacker. This is a defensive team. Now

you can work it's a defensive team. Now. Absolutely, I'm worried about the Cardinal guys about Mica, but the key I think with it, you might not play the Cardinals with those guys anyway, depending on what happens here over the next you know game or so sure you're playing that game. You're not sitting guys for Arizona. There's no way you need to sit guys for Arizona. Maybe Philly. If you don't have a shot at if you have the NFC's secured, you don't have a shot at getting

that first round. By what are you playing again? But that's the point to a void, you loser of the NFC West in the wild. But both those things can't be true though, because if you win the next two, then you're in position because Arizona loss Monday night, you're in position at that point if you beat Arizona to move at least to the third spot, right, which matters, like you don't have to face the MS and is not buying it. I mean, it's just this playoffs is

gonna be crazy. Yeah, the amount of talent in this NFC is absolutely absurd. I would rather take San Francisco and then take the Rams. And so for me, I'm playing that Arizona game because I want to at least get to three. Now, maybe week seventeen, I'm like, you know whatever, if you you get the rest, take the rest. But that week sixteen game like that against Arizona. You need that game, you need game sixteen. Well if they if they beat Arizona, I love getting way out ahead

of the varsities. They beat Arizona, the Philly game becomes meaningful, like you can't afford to lose that, So can't we can't because if you lose to Philly because you sat everybody, then you just give that ground right back and you can get that true true. So yeah, that's what I'm signing. Play out the string is what is the point in my opinion? I mean, you might not have all right, We appreciate you guys join us. We'll be back tomorrow. We'll be joined by Bucky Brooks. Hopefully Nick will be

back in studio. But in the day that he was in, Isaiah, thank you for joinings man. Probably a lot of good perspective. We appreciate that for a Dave Helm and Ambergard Sea Isaiah stand back. I'm Derrek Elton. This has been The Break live on Dallas Cowboys dot Com Radio. This has been a production of Dallas Cowboys dot Com and the Dallas Cowboys Football Club.