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Cowboys. This He's Talking Cowboys, springing live from the Dallas Cowboys World headquarters at the Star in Frisco.
Put Jake Burgers here, Puscott Kinson, Teddy.
And now your hosts Isaiah Standback, Patrick Walker, Josh Rodriguez and Kyle Yeomans.
It's a mundane Monday version of Talking Cowboys, presented by Black Rifle Coffee Company, live from the Star in Fresco, Texas in the SWBC studios. Welcome in, everybody. We've got Patrick noc Walker, Josh Rodriguez, Tommy Yarish with Chris Beam in the back. I'm Kyle Yeomans. After the Cowboys fall to the Denver Broncos forty four twenty four. The fine score in Week eight. It was not pretty, it was not good, and I said this on the postgame shows last night. But there are just some days when you
don't have it and you don't play very well. There are some days when you beat yourself and penalties play a large factor, and then there are other days where the talent on the other side you just aren't as good as and I think yesterday was a combination of the three. You weren't as good as the Denver Broncos. Even when you had the opportunity to play better, you probably didn't. You didn't execute the same way that you
have at different points in the season. And then if all of that fails and you were finally executing, penalties shot you in the foot. Nine penalties for eighty yards, much of that happening in the first half. At least they weren't self inflicted, right, they were all self inflicted. Oh okay, that's how penalties work a lot of the time.
Cool.
Yeah, I saw that one too, But it was just not a good day. Dallas falls to three four and one seasons not over yet, but as Jerry Jones said yesterday, there is a long way to go with this football team. You played a playoff caliber team yesterday, and you saw how you stack up against the playoff caliber team. And I'll start with the gentlemen that were that were there yesterday. Patrick Nosey Walker, I'll let you start. It was not pretty in the Mile High City.
It wasn't. He'll be doing me a favor. Cute that old brother Sounder real quick?
Oh no, it's because I'm here, isn't it.
No, it's not that we love having.
Oh brother, this guy Stacks set a plus to everybody, with the exception of maybe Ceedee Lamb and George Pickens.
They did their best.
Avonte Williams, he did what he could when he was given the opportunities to do what he could. Thirteen the only thirteen opportunities, and unfortunately none of those opportunities came in on that first drive when you were you know, second in gold or Okay, yeah, I'm thinking of I'll give shouts u Queasy Bridges for that interception. Initially, Yeah, to set up the cow Boys offense to go do a thing. But I mean I just named less than a handful of people that actually kind of deserve some credit.
Everybody else stole some money yesterday from the Cowboys and I'm talking coaches too, so yeah, stole some money.
Yeah, yeah, free check.
I do respect what Shotty said, because you know, Shotty got up there and he said, I was not very good today. He said, Matty Riflus was not very good today. Clayton Adams was not very good today. I mean, when you stink up the joint like that, I mean they absolutely got trampled by the Broncos.
There's there's nothing nice.
To sprinkle on it, right, It's just a pile of what it is, which is horse crap. So I don't I mean, the cowboys don't know who the cowboys are right now. So when you asked that Dak Prescott the question last night, you're three four on one, what's your identity? He's like, our identity is inconsistency, perfectly said, because that's
exactly what it is. And Kyle, you pointed everything out perfectly in the in the in the prelude to this, which is you know, you knew that the defense was probably going to struggle based upon the samples as of everything before. You hope they could replicate what they did against the commanders, but you kind of felt like they maybe wouldn't be able to.
Yeah, but you figure you.
Had a little bit of hope, Yeah, a little bit of hope. But you just knew that the offense was going to show up. We tried to say it last week. You just knew they were going to show up.
And everybody was saying, what was the term last week that that was brought up glazing?
Yeah, yeah, well yeah, people said that we were glazing when to Broncos.
How good the Broncos defense.
We tried, we literally tried to tell you that this is what could definitely be the case. I mean, we previewed it on Friday talking about how stout their defensive line was and how they were going to be able to stack the box against the run game, and basically, you know, my thought process was, if Javanti Williams isn't able to get or just a run game, not necessarily just pinning it on Javante, but if the run game isn't able to get going in the first two quarters, the game is done.
Yeah done?
And what would really kill them?
And you lost by halftime, by the way, Yeah you did.
And there's something that correlates here. You basically lost by halftime. Most of those penalties were in the first half. In the first half, oh okay, you had a couple of those that killed the first drive and then it just
kind of went from there. And then on the defensive side of the ball, you had penalties that extended drives and then created situations where they could get a chunk played out of the middle and then run for an explosive touchdown on the ground, the very same drive in which you could have been off the field and three and out. And then you look at just schematically, so personnel wise, the execution was horrible. Schematically it wasn't there either,
because here you are again. You got guys getting wide open touchdowns. Here we are again, you turned down the man coverage. Here we are again. You only blitched, you know, twenty four percent of the time listing or the time, which correlation you only got pressure on bo Nick's twenty four percent of the time.
It's not a lot.
There's not a lot. So whenever you blitzed, you got pressure. Whenever you didn't blitz, you didn't get pressure. Okay, and you weren't stopping the run. Okay, over four hundred yards almost two hundred and seventy yards allowed in the first half alone with those four touchdowns, ball game past the sticks man.
At one point, they were averaging nine yards to carry at one point, Denver, We's.
Denver, well.
Despicable.
That just you don't win games that way.
They're averaging thirteen yards of play at one point too.
Yeah.
Look, you know, I just don't think that this is a great football team, to be honest, Yeah, I think that, you know, defense obviously, it's either to say that defensively because they're so shorthanded, but you know, offensively, they they can do really good things and that's kind of the heartbeat of this team, and that's where their identity if they even have one lies, is hey, we can go and kind of score points and move the ball down
the field offensively. But even still yesterday, I thought they missed some opportunities. Patrick touched on the first drive.
Of the game.
You've got second and goal from the one. Deevontae Williams was the one that got you down there. I think he picked up three yards from the four. I think Brian Schottenheimer maybe got a little bit too cute trying
to throw the ball into the end zone. Sure, you know they've run the slip play action plays really well and it's worked, but I think that's one where look, Denver is a really good line of scrimmage team, and Dallas had a chance early to kind of punch him in the mouth and say, hey, we're here to play We're here to play physical, and I think they missed
the opportunity to do that. And then after that is when you kind of just saw things start to snowball with the pre snap penalties and the procedural penalties and just way too much undisciplined play from a team that is in week eight and you don't know what your identity is. You can't find any sort of consistency relatively outside of the offense, and it's just bad. It's just
not great football. And you know this team. The thing that is worrisome is this team has good players, and a lot of those good players granted didn't play yesterday defensively because they're injured, but the fact that there is no remedy and no consistency is concerning and it brings up a lot of questions. I know the trade will and it's been a big one, and oh do you go out in trade? No? No, no, I don't think you do. I think yesterday shows you. I've said this
from the jump. I don't think there's one player. And we talked about this on Talking Cowboys. Is it last week or the week before.
Two weeks ago when they after they lost to Carolina, We talked about it.
There is no one player. There is no two players unless you get to all pros at their respective positions that can trade that can change this defense for this season. I think you look at this and you say, Okay, the season's not over by any means, but you hold onto those two first round picks and maybe even try to sell some guys here at the deadline and try to gain some more draft capital and look to build through the draft. I think in today's NFL, building through
the draft is a way to win super Bowls. And the Cowboys have now two drafts coming up where they've got four first round picks, and that is a war chest of picks that you can use to completely change this defense. You don't have to use all of them on defense, but you can change everything about your franchise through these next couple of drafts. I know it's difficult pill to swallow, especially when we're sitting in the present
and we're talking about the future. Right but right now this is this is not a team that I think is going to contend for the Super Bowl, even the playoffs. I think that that is that is a that is a big stretch. But once again, you know, this offense is going to be something that can keep you in games. But if your defense can't find any sort of footing, your identity at all, it's just going to be ugly.
And I liked what Tony Romo was saying.
I mean not that I liked those words, I just liked how he brought up that. In they kept referencing this twenty thirteen game, you know, Romo versus Manning and how the offense was able to put up forty eight points and lost fifty one to forty eight, and that being a sort of perfect amalgam for what's happening now
with the Dallas cowboyshere. The offense is just so good and they didn't play very good yesterday, but that was a large part into what the defense was doing, and then of course the penalties that kind of got you in that position.
But for me, the game was lost.
You know, your defense makes a play and puts you in a pretty great position to go get a touchdown, and you were able to muster up three points out of that drive that could turn the tide for you in that game and set the tone for the rest
of the game. To me, that is a huge step back in the aggressiveness that Shody has taken so far this season, and he's been conservative at times, but I think overall he believes in his team, and I think yesterday was sort of indicative of their belief in what Brock Kaffman is able to do at the point of attack. I think there was a severe lack of confidence in what he was doing because you saw it every opportunity
he was getting moved around. And for good reason, they didn't have the confidence there because the Broncos broughen whoa Broncos of line was so good, but at so many points are like Javonte Williams can certainly gain these three yards.
I think you guys all bring up great points because the pass rush gave problems to Tyler Geiton, gave problems on the interior to Brack Kaufman. He had probably his worst game of the year maybe Carolina, which there's a little bit of a coincidence there. Those are probably two of the poorest offensive performances that you've seen throughout the year. Even elite offenses have down games, and they had a down game. They just did not match up well.
We taked time to have it down.
It was a terrible time to have a down game, but they had a down game. You talked about the opening drive. I'm thinking and when I went back and watched it this morning. The drives at the end of the first half were infuriating to me because even if you look at Denver interception, touchdown, touchdown, punt, touchdown, that sounds like they're dominating, they really weren't. It was twenty to ten, Dallas had the football with three mines and
change three forty seven when they took over. You go down the field there and you score, you're within three points. You're close to the end of the first half. We'll see what happens at the end of halftime. But even if Denver tacks on a field goal there, you are within a touchdown to start the third quarter. Yes, if you go down in that area that portion of the game, you're within a possession at halftime more than likely, and you get the football to start the third quarter. Instead,
what happened? You go three and out, You pump the ball away. What does Denver do? They drive down the field, They get a touchdown before halftime, so then they go up twenty seven to ten. Oh and you've got hey, you still got the football. You've got what was it thirty nine seconds, which we've seen. As long as you get Brandon Aubrey and field goal range. You can make it work. Even in the elevation in Denver, Colorado. You can get in field goal range. Kick a field goal.
You're good, completed a couple passes early, got right at the edge of what you would be willing to try with Brandon Aubrey, and then you try a deep seam over the middle of the field to Jake Ferguson into triple coverage. There was double coverage over the top and underneath, but then there was an extra safety coming over to so it was really a Bermuda triangle. As Isaiah called
it yesterday on the postgame show. You're trying that football instead of trying something to the boundary to get out of bounds, set up a field goal attempt, and at least go into halftime with some dignity, down by thirteen points instead of being fourteen points, instead of being down by seventeen. And then you go down and you score, and you're opening drive of the second half and you feel like, okay, are offense starting to feel better again?
Not the case. You're still down by two scores. You're still in a position where your defense needs to stop. And this is not a team that has to need the defense to get a stop. They just don't have the dogs on that side of football. You cannot rely on that. So as much as this was on the defense, and as much as we've praised the offense throughout the season, it was a down day in scenarios where they have converted in situations like that previously. They did not credit
to Denver. They're a good team. I think Denver is a legitimate contender in the AFC, and I don't want to take anything away from that, absolutely not. But if Dallas plans to be a contender in their division, plans to be a contender when they get to the playoffs as Tommy said, or if they get to the playoffs as Tommy said, you got to play better than that against the teams that are benchmark caliber teams that you're going up against. And they did not pass their test this week.
And time and time again, the Cowboys have proved that they don't win those games.
Yeah, those are.
This is the litmus test.
Dallas Cowboys are going up against an actual contender and the result continues to be the same. Outside looking in, of course, I feel very It's the word passionate about you know, how I feel, how good. I think the Cowboys can be. But when you're talking about a defense that cannot personnel wise afford making any mistakes, it's not indicative of a good team. And Tony Roman was seeing himself at the very end of the game as far
as like, this is a team that will. The offense is good enough to keep you in half of these games, yeah, and the other half you know you're going to struggle. And that's exactly what we're seeing right now.
It is difficult to really get a good litmus test on how good this team can be when their three wins are against the Giants, the Jets, and the Commanders.
Those teams have what have come by banged up Commanders, that's.
Seven wins and the Jets got their first one yesterday. Yeah, that's that's telling. And I mean, and then you look at the back half of this schedule Eagles, Chiefs, Lions, Vikings, Chargers, I mean, this is gonna be a this be a long back half of the year.
I liked what you were saying a second ago as far as like, why do we sort of when.
Are we gonna learn?
When are we gonna learn?
Yeah?
Yeah, can you speak more to that?
I think I mean, I predicted Denver would win yeah Friday, So it wasn't a shock. I thought it would be a whole lot closer though, because I I don't believe this team is far off. I really don't. And we've had that debate before about the draft picks and whether it'll hold on to them or whether it or not. And I even asked the question of Stephen Jones a couple weeks back, how much are these next few games going into the deadline going to decide how you handle
the trade deadline? And he said he didn't really give like a full answer in that case. But I think the answer is a ton You go into the deadline at three five and one, you lose this week against the Arizona Cardinals, and with the back half of the schedule that Tommy's talking about, why would you not sell at the deadline? Why would you not take some of these good players that you can accumulate draft picks and try and build around some guys that are still here.
Dak's not going anywhere, CED's not going anywhere. You could still resign George Pickens if he continues to have the season that he's having. Jake Ferguson's not going anywhere, Tyler Smith's not going anywhere. All these guys that you've resigned. The core of your team is staying here, but there are some other players that teams would value elsewhere. So to speak to your quote, and this is a roundabout answer of getting there, or roundabout way of getting there.
I don't think they're far off. But if they don't have the season that you would anticipate, and they certainly haven't to this point, I think you have to look toward twenty six, twenty seven, twenty eight because of what you already have from a draft camp Capitol standpoint. You got to be within striking distance to take advantage of this year and possibly trade those picks and say I need a legitimate pass rusher, I need a legitimate linebacker or a safety or whatever the position is that you
want to address. First, you got to be within striking distance, and right now they are not.
No, it's not gonna take one or two players. I mean, it would take a full overhaul of my opinion in the defense.
And I think you're gonna get a couple guys. I know everybody's probably rolling their eyes when they're talking about oh, Demarveyn overshow's coming back? Or Savonzette Rebel's coming back? And I mean Treyvon Diggs is out. I don't know if he'll ever play another game in the Cowboys uniform. And we'll talk about that at some point down the line too. But all of that to be said, you are getting some reinforcements. If you add those guys and then get
an elite player, maybe it does help. Who am I to say, but right now I don't have a whole lot of confidence that that can help fix this team.
For the audio listeners, Patrick had a perfect response just then because it was just all shoulders.
He's just like, you know what, what do you do?
Shrug because my thought process is I'm hearing everything you guys are saying, keep the picks and build for the future.
That you know, great, wonderful. What's your identity on defense?
So you don't have one exactly, So my follow up to that would be, now that I disagree with those points, my follow up would be, yes, Okay, use those draft picks and war chests. You're going to empty the war chess and for the most part you throw that at defense. Okay, sure, you're throwing it at a defense that has no identity.
It doesn't know what he wants to do. It doesn't know what it wants to be.
And that's the whole conundrum.
Schematically, it doesn't.
Know, So you're.
Throwing telling at it, which is perfectly fun. That's that's your job as GM man, as the scouting department, it's your job. Okay, talent and put the talent in the seats. Okay, now once, but once the talent is in the seats. And what I'm getting at is the root is one of the roots, not the route, but one of the root issues remains miscommunication in that defense. I saw yesterday again the same miscommunication issues that we saw early in
the season when they were getting walloped. Okay, and you're going you look at some of the body language on the sidelines. One particular instance after a big play might have been after a touchdown, I'm not quite sure.
You gotta try.
Queasy Bridges basically passionately trying to explain to kyr Elam whatever. I couldn't read the lips, but it was and I'm like, okay.
So clearly there anybody should know it's right.
So it's the.
Fact that Bridges, who joined late is now having this heated debate. I'm not going to say argument which way went right and we don't know, but my point it could be. My point being when you have defensive players on the sideline having those types of conversations with each other in conjunction with what's going on on the field, the scheme is still a.
Huge question mark.
I feel like every week we're going against the rintler, but the rintler is in the building, like, what's the what are you doing this week? I don't know because last week he was forty eight percent man coverage and then one of the feature films that Isaiah baught was they were going to break the fifty percent mark on man. Wrong they went in the wrong direction. They went back into the thirties. As far as man coverage is concerned, zone courverage that obviously didn't look great. Look at the
wide open touchdown that was in zone coverage. So you know, and now there is another aspect to it, which is, you know, personnel wise, I mean, Jesus christ Man, you had to put your nickel corner at safety because you ran out of safeties, right, So guys right, so that matters as well, So you know, let's talk about everything that matters. But my point being, whether you're trading for a guy or two, and I am on the boat of trading for two guys, not one night two Now you need to you need to pay.
That's rusher and you need the safety.
I feel like the linebacker corp will stabilize once de Marionovshung is back and back to form.
I think that stabilizes things.
But regardless of if you're siding with me and you feel like you want to trade for one or two players, or you're siding with Kyle and Tommy, I think Josh as well. As far as keeping the picks, it doesn't matter which one of us, which one of the tables you sit down at.
Yeah, you have to agree that.
At the end of the day, the problem, one of the bigger problems is what scheme are you?
What are you doing on defense?
And remember, dude, what are you doing?
Remember I also flipped too because I'm I'm worried about and initially I was saying, hold on to the draft picks. I'm worried about wasting Dak Prescott's MVP caliber play. That's where I'm saying, Okay, maybe we should go get a draft pick, but then you look at the defense and the inconsistencies and all of these different elements here to say there is no identity. How much is it going to fix even if you do go and do it. So I don't want to sit here and do nothing.
With Dak Prescott playing the way that he has. I don't want to sit here on my hands and just say, yeah, you know what it is, what it is. Hopefully he comes back in twenty six and twenty seven and plays the rest of his contract like this. I don't want to do that because that's not how the NFL works. You got to take advantage of opportunities when you have
them now. And the most frustrating part about all of this and the debate that you're going to have, is you're either wasting the window or you're throwing potatoes at the wall trying to see if it sticks on defense, and that's what the picks would be. They would be potatoes at the wall. Hopefully a pass rusher helps, Hopefully a safety helps. Hopefully the linebackers start playing better when Demarby and Overshow's back, Hopefully. Savona Rebel is a third
round pick out of East Carolina can play immediately. All of it is a ho and hope is not a strategy, and that's what it is on the defensive side, and that's what's so frustrating for Cowboys fan.
I think hold on really quick above all, regardless of all of this trade, hold on to the picks.
Whatever it is, some needs to change.
Now, you got to do something.
Something needs to change.
I'll make two quick points and then i'll give you all a question going into our break. So number one, to Patrick's point about identity with four first round picks, I think you can find guys who can help establish an identity for you on defense. Not a guarantee. I'm not guaranteeing anything. I'm not Charles Barkley. But I think you can find guys that help you set the tone on defense. And you know, there are a couple of
guys that I love college football. If you follow me on Twitter, you see that there are a couple of guys that I watch around the country and I'm just like, oh, man, I would love to cover that guy because even he's so good. And you know the other thing too, is I have no issue with trading some of that capital for a player. If and only if it is a young player that is under contract for the next three or four three or four years, say three or four years.
And because that would be the only way, I'm sorry, that would be the only way that you could make the most of moving on from a capitol like a first round pick or a second round pick, is if you get somebody that's going to be around for you consistently for this defense. You can't trade for one year rentals at this point. And the question that I'll give you, guys going in a break, We've talked about scheme and
this defense, and oh my god, it's awful. This is the third defensive coordinator for the Cowboys.
In three years.
Do you think that a change is what is needed? Or at some point do you feel like Dallas just has to sit down and give a guy time. Because if you move on from Matt Eberflus, then you've got your fourth defensive coordinator in four years. And at some point you've got to let a scheme stabilize and you can't keep changing things up on guys because some guys are gonna fit great, some guys are not gonna fit great, and you're not gonna know that. So at some point
do you say, Okay, this is our guy. We're gonna give him time, and we're gonna ride it out and see if this can get better.
And we're gonna answer that question on the other side of the break with more talking cowboys. Right after this, I'm home.
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To Talking Cowboys. Back here on Talking Cowboys. This segment is brought to you by invisil Line, the Official Smile of the Dallas Cowboys, with Patrick Noci Walker, Josh Rodriguez, Chris Beam in the back. I'm Kyle Yeoman's Tommy yarsh is in the building and he just proposed a phenomenal question, Thank you the career. First phenomenal question of your career.
Also tell me I wish you were here for a win every once in a while.
Yeah, why would you always show up what.
I call me in whenever they lose? I'm sorry, Well, when I started here, it was I was liaking at the Troit game. I think they lost like what five straight before the Washington game when Cavante Turpin finally got me a win. But yeah, no, if you missed before the break, the question that I posed was, you know, Mattie Refluss, Dallas's third defensive coordinator in the last three years, and at least from my perspective, and you guys, if you have a different opinion, please feel free to throw
it out there. I think it is really difficult for players, and you see this all the time, especially with young quarterbacks, is when they've got a change in their head coach or their play caller, offensive coordinator, whatever it may be, you can see their development kind of really start to struggle.
And guys that have had that turm wheel, like a Justin Fields or even a Baker Mayfield, a guy who's turned it around, can just necessarily not be in the right spot and having different voices over the course of
their career can make things hard. And so my question was for Dallas is at some point, whether it be with Maddieberfluse or even if you move on from them and take somebody else, do you just have to sit down with a guy, even if it means going through a season like you're going through right now, And do you just have to stick with somebody and give somebody time to get something going. I know it's an NFL stands for not for long, and that goes for coaches too,
especially now because nobody is patient. But at some point do you have to settle into, hey, we've got to keep somebody, not just Maddiberflus because Maddie Reflues has not done a good job this year. Just straight up and I don't know if anybody could have been a good job with this personnel, but especially Tony.
Said that yesterday too, he said, I would have a tough time, yeah, if I were in the same.
Situation, especially but especially this unit. It's been very poor. At some point though, do you just need to give these guys a sense of continuity in their defensive play caller, because if you're just going to keep changing things on them you're in and year out, I think it's going to be hard to develop.
I would argue that I don't think that was Dallas's plan necessarily to keep Matt Iberfluse around for a long time. He's a guy that's coming off of a head coaching job. Granted he was fired, but he's sort of one of those bigger names that like, eventually, you know, and Shotty said it before, it's like, oh, he will be a.
Head coach again in the NFL.
I don't think you can bank on that necessarily, that's the least at least now, but that's his goal, right, So I think the Cowboys sort of went into it. It's like, Okay, let's build an identity using what Matt Eberflus wants to do and then sort of build around that.
But you know, maybe it's a dan Quinn situation too, where they kind of anticipated at least a few years of getting that identity figured out right, but you're not seeing it at all, at least with with dan Quinn, you very early on saw indications of what that might be, and that was turnovers, right, Yeah, that was one thing that you could always clean on and pressure.
And you know why they saw the flash of pressure and why they saw the flash of turnovers early in dan Quinn's tenure. Why is that kind of because they struck gold at a pass thrusher. They struck gold with Micah Parsons in the draft.
Where's that guy?
He's in Green Bay? Well last night. That's the thing for me, is you struck gold even they didn't want it. Remember they were at ten in that draft and they were wanting Pats or ten for good reason. By the way, they wanted j. C. Horn. They both go bang, yeah, they're both great players, bang bang in front of them to Carolina and to Denver. They're sitting at ten and they say, mmmmm, maybe we should trade back. We don't
really love a ton of these options. We'll trade back a couple spots, and then if Micah or Rashaun Slater fall to us for good reason fall to us, then all of a sudden, we'll make the pick. They made the pick at twelve after they traded, so even they didn't know what they had or else, they would have taken the opportunity to trade up and go get Micah, just as anybody would have if they would have thought that was the case. They knew of the draft. They
struck gold with Micah. Dan Quinn was able to build his system with an elite pass rusher as a rookie who finished with twelve and a half sacks or thirteen sacks or whatever it was. And that's how they were able to do that. You don't have that guy, don't have that type of player and even the personnel on this team to do that. And remember that was after you had three coordinators in three years as well, because you went.
From and you saw a Dala at the time.
But you have had, like arguably stabilizer.
Stabilized if you had Trayvon Diggs who had played under you pretty well for a year.
The pieces were there.
The pieces are not there right now. They don't have the same person if Kenny Clark and a bunch of dudes some guys.
Yeah, Well my question is when you okay, so when you look at the personnel, if everyone is healthy, look at it from that capacity, and then you ask yourself this in addressing Tommy's question, if you're the Cowboys, you have a personnel set one completely healthy that is designed to primarily run man. So I'll simplify it and just put it to that. Yeah, you have a defensive coordinator
that primarily runs zone right. Yeah, So the question is if you're if you're entertaining or hoping that may even flu stays around because you want the continuity, how long do you think it would take to transition the current personnel to a set of personnel for the new DC to be able to have hopeful success in running the scheme he actually wants to run. Yeah, that'll take two, three, maybe even four years, depending on how you draft. Because you're not going to hit one hundred percent on all
of your draft picks. That's not how it goes. So even though you're one of the better, one of the best actually as far as scouting draft talent, you're just not going to hit one hundred percent of the time. So that's my thing, my concern there is and I'm not saying you know that it can't be done. I'm saying that you have to understand the transition period. So you talk about potentially wasting the window that Dak Prescott has.
He needs a defense and put it out. He played poorly yesterday, but he played poorly because of a couple of decisions. He made the triple coverage Jake Ferguson, don't throw that ball every again in your life.
Just don't. Okay.
At the same time, to be fair, he was under siege all games, so at that point he's trying to play hero ball. He was pressing, and he admitted that he was kind of pressing because he was trying to make something happen, trying to get a spark. So that being said, you have to wonder transition wise, if you want continuity, what's the what's the invoice for the continuity?
Because you got to pay the invoice. What's the invoice If the invoice is it takes you two to three years to get the personnel right for the coordinator that you have.
I don't know, Jim, Yeah, I don't know.
Because in three years from now, is Dak Prescott still playing at this level?
Probably not.
Probably in that case, you need better personnel on defense.
That's where I'm at.
You you absolutely and you need that all around, regardless of your defensive coordinator.
Absolutely, there were problems at the end of dan Quinn's tenure whenever it came to this defense, right, Yes, I mean absolutely. It wasn't perfect with dan Quinn. Everybody wants to believe that those three years with dan Quinn twenty one to twenty three, they couldn't stop a nose billion all those takeaways, the takeaways were great, and it helped tide a lot of the problems. Yes, it helped hide a lot of the issues, and Michael Parsons helped hide a lot of the issues on it.
But this is still a bad run defense regardless.
And then you turn around and you've got Mike Zimmer. You had some hope with Mike Zimmer that he would bring in a new thought process, but you're able to stop the run wrong. Yeah, boom one and done. He didn't have a great year whenever that came around. At some point, when do you look yourself in the mirror as a defense and say this team just doesn't have the personnel. They just don't have the players on defense. Yeah, we've had three coordinators in three years, and I'm sure
some continuity would help. But if you have bad players and you have a bad system, or not even let's take the system out of it. If you have bad players, the best system in the world is still not going to be enough.
It's true.
You can scheme it up as much as possible and it might help a little bit, but it's not going to help you enough to go win what you want to win, which is ultimately an NFC East Crown, ANFC title, and go to a Super Bowl and possibly win it. That's not happening when you have bad players on defense.
I mean, Nick Saban in his prime at Alabama couldn't fix this group.
Like there's just nothing there's couldn't fix the Miami Dolphins.
Well, I'm just saying in general, I'm just one thinking of a good defensive coach.
He went sixteen and sixteen.
That was a great point, thank you, all right, Well, I'll never make a point.
Kirby Smart could Kirby Smart fixed.
Kirby Smart couldn't fix this year, And Kirby Smart makes everything you could put, you could put, you can put burn orange helmets on the other team, and he still wouldn't be able to fix.
H coach of the Jefferson.
Jefferson fixed.
You know what, that's what we need to do. We need to go back to playing defense like it's nineteen thirty seven.
I think that's what you're already doing.
Okay, Well, look.
At how the Broncos have been able to shift. I mean, we were just talking about it last week. Two years ago, they had seventy points scored on them in a season game. And it's not necessarily emmy. Granted, you have Pats er ten, you have a lot of those guys Drake Greenwall who didn't play yesterday, FYI, oh Jesus, But they turned their defense around in two years. Arguably they were pretty decent last year.
Yeah, they're pretty good.
So a year and a half, yeah.
I mean, I don't think it would take that long if you had the personnel.
Dude, the advance.
Joseph has done an unbelievable job with that unit.
I mean, the pride that it took for him to set aside. There's a question he was a head coach and he comes back.
To serrad Up, I'm going to ask you this question, no, head to head, is Vance Joseph a better coordinator right now than Matt Ebraflus, Yes, I mean yeah, then that's probably combined with your personnel point. That's probably why it only took a year and a half to turn it around.
So you've and that's a great point. It's not just one thing exactly, and that's where the frustration contu It's not just one thing, but you got to give some time there because you don't have the personnel. But if you don't have the personnel, then are you really going to have some success down the line too. That's where all of this kind of circles back to teks Scott. And I'm not saying something has to say don't give
the time. I'm saying that the invoice that comes with giving the time is when starts to close on QB one. To transition from this man primary personnel to a zone centric will take a couple of years to establish, establish a solidify, and that's no guarantee that once it solidified, that it certainly pops like you're waiting for that spark, but that spark might not come and one to two years.
And I mean, these are all parts of the conversation, and.
For me, the bigger indicator of that is take the time that you have now to improve the personnel of your defense, regardless of anything. And if that doesn't work, and hopefully it is guys that have two or three years left on their contracts, so you have that flexibility to any on your roster exactly. But this offseason, if we are thinking the same thing and we're not going to the super Bowl this year, probably not breaking news, but use free agency to improve the defensive side of the ball.
Get guys that you.
Know are going to contribute in a big way. I'm tired of the guessing game. You're talking about, you know, rebuilding through the draft, and I totally agree. You're going to need those picks regardless if you're making trades like you have them, you need them. So you're going to need that, You're going to need free agency, You're.
Going to need all of these elements.
Of it everything to rebuild a defense that you can certainly.
Do, yes, if you get the right guys.
Gotta find a way to get the right guys. We'll talk a little bit more about this on the other side of the break and then I want to bring back the offensive conversation. Forty four to twenty four, Dallas loses to Denver more talking Cowboys after this.
How's it going? You see that Cowboys game?
Oh?
I watched.
I've been seeing some good things totally. They have some talent. You have some great talent, and.
They got some fight hoping this is the year me too. Oh, I'm Cody. By the way, I'm Travis. Nice to meet you. Travis. Go, Cowboys Go.
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The Talking Cowboys back here on Talking Cowboys presented by Black Rifle Coffee Company, the official coffee of the Dallas Cowboys, Patrick Nosu, Walker, Josh Rodriguez, Tommy Yarrish, chrispiam in the back from Kyle Yelmans continuing the defense conversation, gives up a season high forty four points, and I mean it wasn't pretty at any point in the You give up twenty seven in the first half, and then right when you have an opportunity to try and make it a
game in the second half, you give up touchdowns again, touchdowns, not field goals, and it all kind of plays a factor. We were kind of talking on the break there a little bit. There was some conversation from other media outlets. I don't want to put a name on it, but other media outlets in the area that are talking about how you might as well trade the draft picks that you have because you can't draft well on the defensive side of the ball, and I get there's some frustration there.
There's a couple second round picks that you've missed on. I mean, you haven't seen it from Sam Williams. We're four years into that experiment. You've seen you've seen why they've done it, the green flags, but then you've also seen the red flags and you've also seen plenty of yellow flags too, in the way that it's all kind of worked out from an official standpoint, I see what you were doing there.
But that's the funniest. A little further portion of yesterday was there was a set of tweets from Patrick where it was like Sam Williams made a great play to tackle for the loss of the goal line. It was like he tweeted out like Sam with a great play. He quote tweets at one play later with and then a.
Flag and there's the penalty.
And that was that was the most like I'm always gonna have one, He's always good for one.
That was the most Sam Williams stretch of football ever. You make it incredible play and then you automatically get penalized. Do on the next play.
But going back to the point second round picks you've you may have missed on Sam Williams, you probably have. You from Marshawn Neeland standpoint, you haven't seen it from Marshon Nland as a second round pick. And Donovan Azarak, who probably has flashed at times, but he hasn't shown the same caliber pass rush you anticipated him to have after you drafted him out of Boston College and after you saw what you did in the preseason and in training camp, felt like he was going to have a
bigger impact. Development is the number one thing for Ezy, same thing for Marshawn Neeland, both guys within their first two years of their career.
I will say, when you've missed, you've missed huge, Okay, and it's.
Glaring the ones that you have missed.
And who are some of those guys.
You talked about Taco, you talked about Mazi.
I mean, those names are going to stick in the craws a lot of Cowboys fans for a long time completely because those are supposed to be like you know, tent Pole guys, right, And you missed big time, But you also drafted Micah Parts.
You drafted Micah, you drafted Trayvon, you drafted to Ron Blaine. You drafted, oh so a Digizu, You've drafted third day three, fifth round pick. Yeah, fifth round pick. You drafted all of these guys that are the core of your defense. The only impact player on your defense right now that you didn't draft was coming from another guy that you did draft, and that's Kenny Clark. I mean, I think whenever it comes to trading the draft picks, don't trade them just to trade them. No, And that's that's.
The supposed to be a philosophy behind.
Yes, you can't just trade them. Oh, we can't draft defensive talent. That's bs. That is terrible football knowledge, just playing and simple because they've missed. Every team is missed. And you missed big on Taco. You missed big on Mazie. Taco was a decade ago. Now Mazzi is at the end of his rookie contract. You missed on them playing in simple Oh well, and that's just part of it.
Yeah.
However, you've made so many good draft picks. You can still use those draft picks in a philosophical way to go and make your football team better. Whether you draft your defensive talent, sure, fine, that's one way, or you go and get it to try not to wage the MVP caliber play. And yes, I know Dak had a down game yesterday, don't take away from what he did was historic the four games prior. Even in a one two to one situation, you still have good quarterback play right now, and you got to use it.
Why you can teams miss?
And if you consider how many Pro bowlayers the Cowboys had that they have drafted, it's not like they've traded for a lot of these guys. I mean, we just talked about how they necessarily weren't using free agency to the best of their abilities of the last few years. I mean, Dallas drafts pretty darn well considering I mean, Philly won a Super Bowl and they picked they drafted Jalen Raker. You know what I'm saying, Like teams miss, it's going to happen. That's what the draft is about.
It's a couple guys.
They've missed on a few guys. You know, it happens. But it's about what you're able to do.
All encompassing free agency is included in this thing, and you finally started attributing that to your game plan in this last offseason.
Guys too, Yes, they have those guys are from Okay.
So here's the thing.
Hey Andrew mccubo, where did he go?
Hook him?
Here's the thing about the Cowboys defense. And this is why, ladies and gentlemen, we're talking about an expensive approach to trying to fix this issue, be it now and or come the off season to come.
And this is a fantastic titbit of information.
I mean, I hate the information, but the science is the science doesn't care what I mean. Shouts out Todd Archid for this one, he tweeted out last night. At the moment, Cowboys have allowed two hundred and fifty points this season, third most through eight games of a season in Cowboys franchise history. You know what other Cowboys teams have given up more than this twenty twenty five version.
Mike On, that's one. That's one and the other. You'd have to go back to the expansion year nineteen sixty when the Cowboys, right when they're playing in the Rochester Jeffersons leather helmets. But no, seriously, you have to go back to the expansion season where the Cowboys joined the league to find one of only two defenses that have performed more poorly than this one. So this is actually saying go ahead and.
Say I don't like those words.
Here's here's how much more disturbing this becomes. For those of us who've covered the team and saw the Rob Ryan years. You need to tell me this, this defense is worse than.
The Rob Ryan years, which it is.
You have to throw everything at it.
You have to throw the draft at it, you have to throw the Eagles approach, the free agency at.
The kitchen, sink, the tub in the out just.
With the water still running, everything, pipes included, everything.
We're gonna talk more about the offense tomorrow. We didn't get back to it. It's I mean, when you give up forty four points in the way that they did, in the fashion that they did, you got to talk a lot about the defensive.
They could have hung sixty on this team if they wanted. Absolutely you can drop in the end zone. By I mean, they, oh my god, shut it down and.
Shut it down. We'll talk more about the offense tomorrow. Plus we'll have some talking Tuesday. We'll take your phone calls eight eight eight eight five five two two nine seven. I'm sure everybody out there would like to have their voice heard. Uh, appreciate you guys being active in civil as much as possible. In the chat today, it's been very active, some good debates in there too, But yeah,
I think everybody's frustrated at this point in time. You're three four and one, you're below five hundred, and the Cowboys have not played very well, uh in a can consistent manner throughout the year, and you want to see back to back games. You want to stack some wins. And now, even if you do get a win this week on Monday Night football, you're back to five hundred and you go into a bye week, so you can't
even stack weeks in that regard. You gotta wait two weeks until you get another Monday Night football matchup against the Raiders. So lots of things to talk about with this football team, and the trade deadline approaching to whether or not they're going to buy or sell will be a question mark. But I just I don't think you can sit here and do nothing. That's where you can't just sit on you answer not with this franchise, was
that go sell? And that's Tommy's vote for Tommy, Ris, Josh Rodriguez, Patrick Nosey Walker, Chris Beam In the back of Kyle Yoman saying so long from Talking Cowboys. We'll see you tomorrow for a Talking Tuesday.
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