Talkin' Cowboys: Evaluating the Week 1 Loss

hour to talk about it. Rob Phillips hosting for Bill Jones today, Brian brought us joining as always, read his notebook on Dallas Cowboys dot Com. Right now breaking down the cowboys sixteen to eight opening loss Carolina, William Boykin's next door producing and before we get started, welcome back, Mick. Yeah. Should I hang my headphones on the on the mic here? Yeah? Sure, that was pretty cute. I hang them up. That's being

really creative, right there, some creative producing. Yes, absolutely, that was kind of genius. I expecting done. I expect we have more drops of you, Mickey, so we could have just done you from Scott Ahead and just kept dropping and have my answers. Yeah, I expected to see one of those big head fans sitting here, you know, with my face on it, a big mickey fathead. That'd be cool. I watched, Yeah, almost called in, but I didn't want

to stop down the show. Blood pressure, Okay after watching that night, Yeah, I think so it actually went down this morning. That's good. That's good. We're glad to have you back. Glad you're feeling better, and uh, glad you could join us for breaking down a tough loss yesterday. I mean, there was some good, There was some and like Brian's headline said on the website, there was definitely

some ugly. Cowboys lose of the Panthers sixteen to eight, fifth time in the last nine games this football team hasn't reached ten points. Yeah, single digit points. Offense struggled. What's what's y'all's first impressions or quick impressions from the game. It was awful. It was as bad as opener I think I've seen. It actually took me back to nineteen eighty nine, a one in fifteen team twenty eight to nothing to the Saints offensive ineptitude. They didn't do anything

right that day. I think they ran for like twenty yards, never came close to scoring. The quarterback got beat up, and yeah, this was I expected it to be a little bit of a struggle, but not that bad. I just think it didn't think it would be that bad. My column that I'm going to send to you here and when we finish said it looked like a team that hadn't played football in three weeks. And that's exactly what it looked like. Maybe they needed a few preseason reps.

Well I don't know. I don't know how you handle that, but it took them all the way to the fourth quarter before offensively, they acted like they were knowing what they were doing. And the worst part was is those first four possessions, you had two penalties and two sacks out of those four possessions, and you were facing second

and seventeen, third and twenty six. And then finally when you got to the fifth possession, when you had a chance on third and seven, Dak on the run instead of setting his feet, tries to throw off his back foot and short hops Jarwin by what ten yards? Yeah, clearly wide open. Yeah, And when you're struggling like that, you just can't make a mistake like that, and you know, and not to keep going on and on, but the darnedest thing of the whole game, they only lost sixteen

to eight. It was sixteen to eight, had a chance, had possession right. As bad as they played, Carolina wasn't great either offensively, Brian, but they were. But it's hard to be as poor offensively as the Cowboys were, especially

early in the game. Yeah, you know, and I want to believe that the coach and staff had a really good plan for how to handle Looke Keekley early in that game, you know, or how to how to kind of take care of him, and it seemed like though in the second half they were able to do some things where they were able to get him blocked and didn't allow him to completely wreck what they were doing.

The thing that you know, Mickey talked about the third and seven and the short hot plays and all that stuff like that, and you know that he's absolutely right about that. It looked just as bad on film this morning, is that, as you saw yesterday, he could have helped Williams on the sack that he gave up. Yeah, you know, Kwan short beat him clean early, but he had, He had Jeff Sway curled up, you know, and he was looking right at him for a chance to throw the ball.

I have no idea why he didn't try and hit Jeff Swain to get the first down. You know, he looked at him, and you know, he just didn't pull the trigger. And there were several plays like that where you know, people are saying, well, with the receivers open, and that was something I was looking at last night. I was thinking, okay, am I gonna watch this tape this morning and feel like that receivers weren't getting open.

And there were times where there were receivers open and Prescott came off one one time where he had the opportunity on third a third down play, you know late in the game, where he could have hit Swain for a touchdown. He could have hit a Gallop for a touchdown. Uh in the you know, on the same play he didn't throw, he ran. He luckily he got the first down, kept the drive going. He missed a Gallop on the on the crossing route right there late in the game

that would have put them deep in Carolina territory. If he throws the ball in front of Gallop right there, Gallop is on his way, and you know, you're looking at maybe a different situation right there. But I just feel like though that there was there was too many times in this game where Prescott made reads and didn't read the correct thing or for some reason, and he's going to sit down and look at the tape and go, oh my gosh, why did I not throw that? Why

did I not see that? Why did I You know, he's got Cole Beasley on a third down play too, where you know, it's a bunch of formation. It's the third and three play. I want to believe and if I had the distance right, but he's still they got bunch of formation, and the design is to get Beasley inside, and Beasley's inside it, but for some reason, Prescott not patient enough to allow him. You know, he looks at him and then he immediately takes his eyes and goes outside,

and you're going, wait a minute. Design of the play is to get Cole Beasley inside. You had him, he had the corners beat, you had their coverage on their heels. You could have hit him. It would have been a

first down. So there were a lot of plays in this game where either Dak Prescott reads affected the way that the play was executed, and the offensive coordinator will get a lot of grief for bad play calling, but there was a lot of poor execution, mainly by your quarterback, that affected the way those plays were run, you know. And this is and I got reminded the downside of watching the game on television, which I hadn't done since

nineteen eighty eight. Broke your streak, unfortunately. Well, but at least I was working when I didn't cover those games. But when I was at the Olympics in Seoul, South Korea in eighty eight, the Summer Olympics, we watched the games on TV, and I forgot how much you can't see on television. It was frustrating, number one, that you

can't tell who's in the game and who isn't. And then number two, you never know what's going on in the secondary with the receivers right right right, And you know, and I probably should apologize to the fans out there that have to watch the game on TV when I get impatient with them when they talk about, well, the

receivers did this. You can't see what the receivers are doing. Yeah, it's impass it's tough, and I went back and you know, watch the game again, and you just don't know, and so you can't see what the quarterback should be seeing or not seeing. And it's it's it's what a luxury to be at the games to see those things from above. No question two is great. Yeah, And it's one of the things why you know, after games and stuff, I sit there and talk about Okay, this that and the other,

a rite about it. Then then you get to the opportunity and fortunately we get to sit down and watch this and you do, like Mickey says, you do get to see receivers run routes. You do get to see tight ends run routes. You do get to see, oh my gosh, Ezekiel, if he doesn't get tripped up in the flat, that's going to be a big play. It's gonna be him and Luke Keikley one on one at the sticks to see if they can get this first down. You know, those are things you don't always see, you know.

You know, Dak Prescott, well, oh on that throw to the short hop throw, well, immediately you think run run run. No, Well, Luke Keikley standing right there bearing down on you. So he had to make a decision like, okay, am I gonna beat Luke Keikley to the sticks or I'm I gonna try and make this throw with my feet, like Mickey said, not being stable. You know, he comes back and makes that same throw later in the game. It's

just from a little bit less of a distance of him. Now, I'll tell you what though, Jarwin is is you know, and I'm not blaming Jarwin. He's a young kid, but he's drifting away from Prescott instead of if he felt like I'm so open, I need to stop and just allowed Dak to get me the ball, that probably would have been the best thing to have happened. Maybe a veteran tied end or a veteran receiver makes that adjustment like I'm so open, I don't need to keep drift

up the field. I need to keep in position here to allow my quarterback to get me the ball. If he's probably four yards further up the field, they have a chance for a completion there. But it didn't work out. There were a lot of plays during this game where it was what if, Oh my gosh, they could have why didn't they execute? Again, I am not defending Scott

Linahan here, I am defending. I'm not defending anybody, really, I'm just saying though he asked these guys to make plays, and there were several guys in this game that did not make enough plays. That was the bottom line, because that's the narrative coming out of this game. Of course, it's fire the coaches and all that, and you're talking to a guy who's the blowtorch of fire coaches. Okay, I you know that's something that I live with, you know,

But but I'm trying to also be fair. And when you watch, if you know, quarterbacks always Jason Garrey says, we try and put these players in position to make plays. Somebody should have been blocking Luke Keikley, you know, whether it was a puller, whether it was a down block, whether it was a combo block. You don't allow Luke Keikley just to run free all day. That is a poor game plan if that's your game plan. But what happened they did in the second half. They got bodies

on him. One of Zekiel It's best runs was, Okay, they get a chip, they get a down block from the tight end to seal the edge, and then they get and then they get swayed inside on Keikley. Now what happens you're running on the safety. That's how the plays designed to go when it's executed well and blocked well. But again the narrative is the offensive coordinator sucks. And to Mickey's point, when you watch the TV copy, you

say the offensive coordinator sucks. But then when you get into watching the All twenty two, you're like, Prescott missed this. Oh what was he looking at there? Oh, really good route? Wait a minute, why didn't Why didn't Jeff Swayin blocked down on that time to get Keikle. If he gets Chickley, they got a shot. That's what happens to in these games. I think. I think it also emerged that there was

no Travis Frederick out there. Yeah, but you know, I didn't feel like Mickey when you go back, I'm saying Looney played, yeah, poorly well, but I think the second the second level blocks that weren't fair. That is fair. That is where you you know, with with Frederick, we always say this, he cuts the defense in half with his ability to play in the second level. He knows how to Okay, Travis has got he's got excuse me, h Zach's goott has got here. I've got to go

up where Looney's not. Really I'm fighting, I'm fighting. I'm fighting. Oh wait a minute, I got to get to the second level and I can't quite get there. And then now you have guys running free. You're concerned going into this game. As we were wrapping up the week, Bryan's concern, Mick was that Carolina front seven, not necessarily the defensive line, but that whole front seven. Keikley flowing to the ball, fast linebackers, he got Coan short and done, Terry Poe

in there. Can they block up front for Zeke? And Zeke finishes with fifteen kerries sixty nine yards. I think he only had eighteen yards in the first half. They just couldn't get anything going up the front, Zeke and the talk coming out of the game, and Zeke said in the second half they didn't really run anything much differently, No, they just executed better as you said they did. You know that first half, Mick, I think you alluded to it.

Third and twenty six, third and twelve, third and ten, third and eleven, third and seven there had said that they're behind the change. Really the whole first half. So what are you gonna call. You're the offensive coordinator, what are you calling? That's tough, right, He called a screen and if the if the running back would have kept his balance, it might have been a first down. I mean, they're trying to chip away at that. Again, I am

not defending Scott Lenahan. I think there's criticism for everybody here, you know, I really do. But but to put to put it all, I think my saying is always its slow hanging fruit to say, Okay, it's the OC's fault. There's no creativity here. You know they were they were a Travis Frederick blocking the back from having a really good design. Play on that screenplay, second play of the game. Smith,

Oh it's gonna be Tyron Smith. Excuse me, Tyren Smith. Yeah, that Tyron Smith at this fighting like hell to get to the outside to get that block. Bradberry, the cornerback, ducks him and it makes it Tyren Smith's in a rough spot because he's thinking, if I don't get this block, is Tavon Austin gonna make this play? And this is not having enough experience with Tavon Austin knowing that he's

a little bit of an elusive guy. You know, if you have a guy out there you're kind of comfortable with, like, Okay, I don't need to get this block. He's gonna make the first guy miss. But he gets caught no man's land. He says, I've got to get this block, where an actual ouity he really didn't need to get the block.

Smith's gonna make the play. Those are the kinds of things that happen when you do call the good play, but you do have a negative play or a negative result because of a penalty or a misread or an indecision or a sack or a sack yeah, or a minus run early and that is that one of the rules they changed on the line of scrimmage that you can't push a guy from behind. You can't push a guy. I always thought you could do it within the tackle box. Yeah, that was that was clipping and pushing and all that

was available there but on the outside. Because they had it come back, they ran another screen that had the same exact thing happened and they got another push. I mean Zack Martin pushed as well, but they didn't call it. So sometimes you're at the mercy of what happens. But I'm not sitting here and making excuses for the offense because they've got to be better. They've got to be better running the football, they've got to be better executing blocks,

and the quarterback has to be better making decisions. He didn't help Connor Williams on that sack. Connor Williams is beating. We talked about that at nauseum, that Connor Williams is going to struggle at certain points and times in this game. And that was the one time that Kawan Short got him and dacted at an opportunity to get rid of the football, and for some reason he didn't do it,

you know. And on that play, it was very smart on the Panthers because it looked like Looney was set up to help Connor Williams, but Short went to the outside where there was no help, right, and then he got bent over. You know, you were talking about Keekley. There was one play he was in the middle and he ran across all the way to the end to make the play and no one touched him. It was just like me saying, Okay, I'm going to go over

there and run around and make a play. It's it's you know, there's it's a bad If you want to blame the coaches for that, then bad game plan. If your game plan was not to block Looke Keekly, that's a bad that's a bad game plan. But I want to believe their game plan was to block Looke Keeklely. Yeah, he's there, Sean Lee, He's gonna make plays all over the field. The one the one thing I didn't like,

and it was almost being stubborn. I think that this is what we do on offense, right when you run two tight ends, when you run three tight ends, all you were doing is inviting Carolina and put eight guys in the box. And the one time they had three tight ends, they had nine guys. They had nine guys up there. Well, where do you think you're going? Yeah, why this team is always ability to run out eleven personnel And I guarantee the Giants game plan this week.

They need to sit down and look at the Giants and what Jacksonville tried to do to him. But you know, you know they Garrett even mentioned it in the post game. He said, hey, we started to spread them out a little bit. We had some success. Should have done that soon. But that's that's that's where that's where, that's where you're that's where it. Now you fall the coaches, how quick did you get to the adjustment? Should you have been

running the ball inside? And Connor Williams didn't play terrible. He Connor Williams and Joe Looney did not play terrible. Kanto. I thought he was going to wreck this run game, but they had. It was really Luke Keikley. Luke Keikley. The inability to stop Luke Keikley hurt them early, but again once they started blocking him or at least getting a hat on him. You know, they run a play. They ran a play where um, they get the ball.

They get the ball the outside to Zeke and he's but you know, Lyle Collins is able just to get enough, just to get enough at Keikley. It was the the option play for the touchdown, you know, on the I thought it was all designed play option on the goal line. Dac does a nice job fake the read and you know, or fake the pitch, gets the defense to commit and then pitches it. You get a block on the outside

from Hearns. But but Lyle Collins was able to get just enough of Keikley to affect his ability to get all the way of the outside, like Mickey's talking about, so Zeke outruns him. That's what you had to do. You didn't have enough of those affect Luke Keikley affect Luke Keikley, affect Luke Keikley. You allowed him early in that game to affect the way you ran the football tackles that he was all over the field. He was man of the match. He trust the man of the match.

And by the way, else struggled some too. Yeah, it wasn't just those guys in Oh no, the holding call was a devastating play late in that game. Yeah that led Oh yeah, well, n of the one that led to the forty seven, not the one where not the one where he tackled, not the one where he tackle the guy where he the holding call on the final drive of the game was it was a and he and it was a rodeo move. I mean, he he was over extended. He had no choice but trying to

pull the defender down. And you know the official is standing right there. They're gonna call that every time that is a He's like it was like bulldogging. You know, you grabbed the stair around the head and you take him to the ground. Which, by the way, I did get the opportunity to watch the Giants game, and the Jaguars did a really nice job. When Fournette was in the game, he got hurt, sure. I think it was sometime in the second quarter, and they were doing a

lot of misdirection. They were getting the ball on the outside, pulling their offensive lineman and not trying to go head up with snacks and all the rest of them, and they were having a lot of success running the football, and then for some reason when Fournette went out, it

just kind of changed what yelled in there. It wasn't bad, but they had they had gotten the ball on the edge on those guys the way you would want to put those big heavyweights if you if you find a way to get the ball to the edge, you could set some stuff up going inside. The adjustment is play wide, play wide, play wide. Don't you get him. Continue to do that and then you have some opportunities up inside.

I may note of it that first drive out of the second half, third quarter, Zee gets two yards on first down and then they go four wide. The next two plays, Herns gets a twenty yard game right and then and then Zeke he captures that edge. A couple of plays later they spread them out it. Yeah, that was an adjustment. I thought that started to work a

little bit. Yeah, they did. And the Herns play for twenty yards was been critical of Prescott here, but nice read on his part, keeping his eyes down the field. He's gonna flush to his right, He's gonna go back to the inside. Hearns does a veteran move of getting making sure that Luke Keickley goes past him. As Keickley goes past, he curls up inside. That's what you have to have. You need more of those types of plays. They didn't make enough of those big chunk plays that

we that we've seen from them in the past. And you mentioned earlier, Rob, they've they've had a problem scoring here, they've had but they've had more of a problem sustain aiming offense. That that was that was a big, big problem for them yesterday, no question about it. Let's take our first break, we come back. We'll keep breaking down the offensive struggles. We'll get into the defense a little bit. How they played debut of Brett Maher in the kicking game.

You knew that was going to happen, not what you wanted. Two nine seven is the number. We'll return in a moment on talking Cowboys, back to talking, back to talk. It can be hard to find the right resource for learning about important financial matters. You search how to build savings, you end up reading about the one weird ingredient from supermarkets that can make you taller. That's why Bank of America build Better Money Habits dot Com, a safe little

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and neat some nestling yesterday. Nestling offensively. Yeah yes, By the way. Cowboys kicking off the regular season at T and T Stadium September sixteenth against the Giants. Excuse me. Tickets are only forty bucks. By the way, night game. Get yours now before they sell out at Alice Cowboys dot com, and they'll be looking for a much better performance all the way around, especially offensively. Before we touched

on the defense. Just getting back to Dak Brian nineteen to twenty nine hundred and seventy yards, no picks, but no touchdowns. He got sacked six times, although a few of those were ay, clear catchup mode in the second half. Sure, how do you feel about just where he's progressing at this point or is it because that's the narrative, it's like, Okay, where's he going? Is he regressing? Yeah? Obviously it's a brand new receiving corps and they use all six of

those guys. They did play all six, shuffling them in and out different spots. Do you think, number one, what are your thoughts on Dak going forward? And also do you think at some point you think they're trying to pare down this receiving core a little bit? Well, I think they will pare it down. They'll figure out what they want to do combination wise and see who works

who doesn't work. Because Dad didn't want to use this as an excuse, but this is the first time I think all six of those guys were available in the same game, and he only two preseason games. Yeah, he's had a lot of practice time with most of those, Yet a lot of practice time of those guys, not a lot of game reps. So I don't know if that's an excuse, but it's something that Look, it's four out of six guys or brand new to the team,

so maybe it's gonna take a little time. No, they're gonna need to find They're gonna need to pair the thing down to find out the best combinations they have for their guys, you know. But there were guys open. There were some times, you know that they didn't get off. The guys did not get off some coverage. You know, Michael Gallup struggled to get off some coverage. We saw

what happened to him. He got interfered a couple of different times, but that was a lot because he was just getting getting taken care of it the line of scrimmage. I mean, he just could not separate fast enough, you know, to to do that. I thought Cole Beasley was outstanding for him yesterday. But really, you know, we talked about Alan Hearns the one play that he made the veteran move, but they didn't have near enough of those. They didn't have.

But also though on the quarterback he didn't do a very good job of finding those guys, and then you know whether he was feeling pressure, whether he was having to move. You know, there was some plays that he clearly missed. I brought up the Gallop across the field late in that game. He throws that ball out in front of gallop. We're talking about the Cowboys being camped out inside the red zone right there, with a chance to go tie that football game. But he throws the

ball behind and unfortunately, though that's a mistake. Now, there used to be a time where if Dak Prescott was nineteen of twenty nine for say two hundred and forty two yards and a touchdown, they were winning these football games. Now those are always kind of the magic numbers for Dak. But he's nineteen of twenty nine for one hundred and seventy, no touchdowns, no interceptions, and they lose. You know, that

just shows you, really what the key part is. They need the other element of their offense, which is their running game, was going to bring up. How many yards did they run for in the first half? Zeke had eighteen at the league, I think they ran for twenty. It's just clear dating back to last season, especially that

final eight game stretch where he didn't have Zeke for six. Right, if they're not running the ball dynamically and they're not in those short yardage situation, second third round, and this is a lot of quarterbacks in the league, it's not good for Dak. He needs he needs to be in second and six, third and two, all that kind of right stuff. Right, It's tough for him because then you're talking about how he has to make plays down the field,

but he also has to read what's happening. And if you want to say there was regression in that area, I'll say it. I'll say there was. There was. I thought that Dak Prescott in year three would see the field better. It's one game. It is one game, and you know, Carolina, he's he has to worry about his left guard, he has to worry about his center, you know. But there were some times where he just did not

pull the trigger on some throws. And whether that's he's thinking like I can't make that throw or I just I need to just fight for the next play, I don't know. But there were some guys that were open, and the problem is these guys don't get open all the time and when they do get open, you better take advantage of that. And that was the issue they had. So did Thompson not get into the game to late when I saw him actually catch some passages? No, No,

he was playing. They were they were playing him. Yeah, they play from the jump. The guy, the guy that kind of went out of the game was Austin. Austin was the one they started early. They clearly had a package or two for Austin, you know about you know, every I always laugh when they throw four screens in the game, and I didn't get the what they're run screens?

I didn't get that question, you know, I didn't get that tweety in a screen to a tight end that it was actually a wide delay, which was a great call, and it was a well executed play. They're capable of executing good offensive plays, they really are. They there, they are,

they are. But but this team, this the margin of RAA for this team now with the wide receivers is is pretty pretty slim, pretty slim, because you've got to take advantage of when they're open and when they're not, and when they're not open, and you you have to do something else. Those tight ends they've got to do something else. There's nobody there. You know, you could talk about Dez and you could talk about Witton as those

guys used to hang your hat on. So yeah, I mean those guys were big part of what you did offensively. But you know, the quarterback has got to be better, the play caller has got to be better, and the execution overall the offense has to be better. Now he flipped this around on the the other side of the football, felt like there were some good adjustments. You know, when you looked at the first half what they were doing

with Cam Newton. You know, I don't think they expected Cam Newton to sit there and pull the ball down as many times as he did on the on the readoption stuff. You think that was straight and he had fifty nine rushing yards in the first quarter. Yeah, and then the second half they figured out and a lot of it was scheme problem. A lot of it was and Sean Lee stood up there and took the you know, fell on the sword for hey, I've got to play better. I've got to do and he's right. He missed a

couple times, he missed a cup miss. It was very Unshawn Lee, you know, you're thinking about two really good mike linebacker or two linebackers, I should say two really good linebackers, you know. And I think I said in the postgame show, this defense played well without Sean Lee and Jalen Smith both playing well, which we kind of felt like, oh my gosh, this defense has got to

have both these guys play well. But they really, they really were able to hold up on the back end, and they were able to hold up, you know, upfront when it came to pass. What was the big worry, Well, it was going to be this young secondary, right, they played the best. Yeah, secondary, they shut They shut that team down. Yeah, basically, uh and Cavan Frasier, I wasn't terrible.

He was fine, right, broke up a pastor McCaffrey. The problem was that they were not disciplined early in the game when Cam was running the ball that there was one play where DeMarcus Lawrence cut way inside and all Cam had to do is come around the corner. Same thing with Wilson on the one played Damian Wilson shot I think it was the touchdown, right, Yes, he shot in there, and it's like, just play your responsibility, you know,

don't start freelancing on him. You gotta give credits the North Turner there in terms of their offensive line is compromised, so we might have to Cam's got to use his legs a little bit more in this play he did. It's like, okay, Rod Marinelli, you want this aggressive offense, everybody getting up the field. Defense, Yeah, I mean defense. Everybody's being aggressive. Well, okay, now you better account from

our quarterback because he's coming at you. That's something that you never felt like with under the Mike Shula administration when he was the OC. It was a lot of the readoption, read option, camera on camera, on camera on you know, you're getting a lot of that, and then you kind of go back. You're thinking, well, Norve's not gonna want him to run, Norves want him to throw the ball beyond time and all that stuff like that. But no, he really pulled it out. He reverted back

to play to the strength of Cam Newton. Cowboys, like Mickey said, took the bait on a couple of those some outside runs pulling the ball. But you know, second half, I think Chris roh, Shard, Rod Marinelli, those guys did a much better job of saying, hey, everybody just do their damn assignments here and we'll be okay. The receivers didn't really affect the way they played. Greg Olsen got hurt in that game early, and that I think that helped the fact that he wasn't out there and they did.

They took advantage of a beat up offensive line. They've got some talent when guys like Ross and and and those guys are making plays. And you know, I mean, it's not Taco making plays. That's that's only that's Randy. Randy Gregory wasn't even really in the game. He got early early concussion and he was out. So now it was up to Taco and ross And and those guys to have to make some plays up front in order

to kind of hold this group together. Funny part of the broadcast when he started running Cam Joe Buck turns to Troy and he goes, So did North carl your number that many times? But in the nineties. But the point was is that, like Brian said, he took advantage of what maybe Cam does best. And I don't think

anybody was expecting that out of North. They wanted to structured timing based off absolutely and in the interviews ahead of time before the game, they did a uh they did an interview with Cam Newton and he said that when Norv was named the offensive coordinator, he was scared. He was nervous because he thought Norv has this cookie cutter idea of what a quarterback is and he was going to do that to me. And then when he came in, he said, we started talking and Norv told me, well,

if you don't like that, we'll throw it out. Yeah, We're going to take advantage of what you do best. Yeah, and I thought that's what he did. Well, that's and that's where that's where the fan out there is going to go, well, why doesn't r OC do there? Why doesn't r you know, And to a point, they're absolutely right take advantage. When they started running a little bit more of the read option, they started blocking Luke Keikley better, they handled the front a little bit better where they're

able to make those four or five yard runs. You know, things are a little bit better. But you know, there wasn't that a jay. It wasn't using it wasn't using Dak press guy. They did finally two point conversion. Yeah. As a matter of fact, Troy called it. Oh, we all we were in the studio, we're away. Here comes yeah, quarterback, everything walls goes, he goes, he goes, oh man, this is quarterback draw all the way and we're all like

holding our breath because he's right. We knew, you know, it's just a matter of okay, Ken Dak beat somebody to get into the end zone, and he beat the safety h Jones there to get in. Yeah. Did anybody, I mean, did you read the line on DeMarcus Lawrence? It was pretty good, Mick, I don't know what off the time, everybody was worried about him being a one year wonder. So seven tackles, one sack for seven yards, three tackles for losses and a quarterback hit and one

forced fumble. He had the edge in that matchup, no question, and he capitalized on it. And and Brian wrote about this too. I thought Taco played well on the other side. I did. Yeah, Now he and I think we talked, you talked about earlier in the week. He's gonna play more of those running downs in bass and then when you get in those clear passing situations, Gregory, when he's st and on the field, he had doing that he had a great spin move to the inside. That's yeah.

If Cam didn't get rid of the ball right, it was a sack. See and they and they Unfortunately the thing that we might remember a little bit about Lawrence was on third down, they get off the field, but he has the goes low into and that's and that's you know, and I get I get Walt h I get Walt Anderson calling that, you know, you want to protect these quarterbacks. You would hope that if they went low on on Dak that they could have gotten that

taken care of. But that was the first drive. Yeah, yeah, but that's those are the kinds of things that you you know, you have to you know, when you get your when you get your defensive line up the field, and you, like Mickey said, that's you know, those are things are going to happen. But the thing that I took away from this is that this defense played well

enough to win the football game. And they played well enough without Sean Lee having to play well and Jalen Smith having to play well because I didn't think that neither one of those guys was all that great. Yeah, and and and and all along it was like, oh god, they have these linebackers, they've got to play great for the to win. They've got to have they got to have linebackers played. But the front did a great job and the secondary did a great job too, holding up.

What do you think of vander Esh because he rotated in, they would they put him in for Yes, occasionally, Yeah, for somebody that has not had a lot of reps in the summer in the summertime. And I'm a very much a wait and see guy on Layton Vanderesh. But Layton Vanderesh in that game didn't do anything that killed you that you were like, oh my gosh, he's blown a coverage here, Oh he missed a tackle, that kind

of thing. I didn't see that from Layton Vanderesh. I thought he had one play where he he tried to hit the hole and got blocked up black and it was the wrong hole and Kaffrey went right up the middle. Yeah, that's that. That's where that's the one time you know when you watch him play that sometimes instincts get the best to him. He's thinking, Okay, I can I can do this and it ends up being the wrong play.

But overall, I yeah, I don't I didn't you know he didn't play very much at all in training camp. He didn't get you talking about somebody to get any games at all. I was surprised he played that. Yeah, I was too, to be honest with you, but that the defense, The defense, I think is the one thing that you could kind of say, Okay, they played well enough to win this football game. Offensively, you just didn't. You give up sixteen points that ought to usually be enough.

And when they gave up ten points in the first half and got down ten nothing, Carolina starts one drive on the Dallas thirty five because of a thirty yard punt return aloud. That was huge, and then they get a field goal at the end of a half starting at their own thirty eight after I think it was an Anthony Brown penalty, that fifteen yard penalty that got him flip fuel position a little bit. So they played well enough to win, not good enough all the way around, though.

Cowboys fall to oz and one to start the season. Sixteen to eight was the final score. Let's go to our final break and we come back. Let's keep breaking it down. We haven't touched on the special teams really yet. Kicking situation, we'll take your phone calls as well five five to two nine seven next. Cowboys fans know that the second best of anything simply won't cut it, and

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But you're okay. Vandersh played twenty five percent of the snaps. There you go, seventeen seventeen snaps. That's pretty good, man. Try to get some work. I'd even realize I headed here nice. All right, you guys, wanna let's hit some phone calls. Why not see what Cowboys Nation feels about last night's game, lost sixteen to eight to Carolina. I'll say one thing real quick. Absolutely, we're doing well, folks, really trust me. We're doing well, just go to it.

We'll be good. Mark and Tampa, we're doing well. What's on your mind? Good morning, gentlemen, Long time playing, long time listener day, back to the seventies of the fan. What got Nick? Well? I definitely wanted to not pile up on the offensive coordinator and the offense itself, but I feel that looking at this offense and the conservative nature that it continues to show us, I think a lot of US fans don't realize how much Tony Romo played as far as game planning and being a de

facto offensive coordinator. I think his offensive mind was genius, and I think a lot of the success in the past was predicated on things that he could see on the field. Even when he wasn't planning, he was backing up back. He was a godsend to dam And with that said, looking at this particular game, I just expected more creativity. When you start Deontay Thompson at wide receiver, Yeah, I expected some you know, double moves something of that.

I wrote about that, yeah, and we just didn't see that. So it's very disappointed not to see that. And you know, that's that's my ZAM thing. I appreciate the therapy session. Let me ask you this real quick. Yeah, so you don't you do not like the quarterback at all? Am I Right? As far as that, yeah, yeah, yeah, I love that. Okay, Well you were talking about you were singing the praise of Tony. Is that because you're saying because as far as the OC, that's the offensive coord Okay,

I got you, Yeah, I got you. Tony was very u integral to the offensive game plan. I think he did more than we'll ever know. Okay, Okay, thanks Matt, No, thank you. And he did and we do have to emphasize how many years he had in this system or a lot, yeah, a lot of years in this system.

Um Dack's in his third year at some point, at some point he's gonna have to get it though, Yeah, and take control of it, to take control of it and move forward and be able to a little bit, you know, consistingly as you said, consistently make some throws down the field to kind of break things up. It helps when you can run the football though, that helps any What is being more creative? Mean? Because the second play of the game, they threw a great little screen

right yeah to Austin. Yeah, I mean they tried the jet sweep, and they tried throwing screens a lot of times. Though if the quarterbacks on the run, it's not easy and you can't throw a nine route. Yeah. I was waiting for it, and I was waiting for it just to throw it, to throw it right, to show it, show it. Yeah, And I don't know that he ever had time to throw it. He missed some throws. He missed throws, I give I give you he missed some throws and he didn't take some throws. That that was

the thing. It was funny. He threw a ball that was really kind of strange. Beasley ran like a little curl and side the ball went way to the right. I mean, I think Troy made a comment. I'm like like, oh, that's just awful, And you know, it looked awful the time, but then at the end you watch it's like Beasley kind of said, was I supposed to stay outside or

was I supposed to go? You know? And Dak's like kind of pointing in Beasley's pointing, and you're wondering, do you throw the ball there thinking that Beasley was going to be there, or did Dak just flatness the read so there's I trust me, I am. I am all about what's going on with the offensive coordinator. I get it out there, folks, I really really do. But there there are times where he does call plays where they're

not executed well enough. And that's and that's on that's on the front office, that's on the coaches, that's on everybody to say, Okay, these guys. The responsibility for Dak Prescott is to do this, and the responsibility for the receiver is to do this, and the responsibility of the blocker is to do this. There's a lot of responsibility going on here, but that tends to be one or two guys to get the finger pointed at him at

the end of the day. As our mail bad questions show this morning, Yeah, we may do that later in the day. What are you gonna say, Mick, No, I was wondering what the mail pack questions? Oh, a lot of Scotland, A hand on Jason Garrett stuff. Yeah, that's that's dominating the mail bag. It's it's low hanging fruit, it really is. And it's not need to figure out need to figure out why Prescott does what he does. Need to figure out why the blocking scheme is what

it is. You need to figure out why the routes are what they are. You know, is there poor execution, is their lack of understanding from the coaching staff on to get it to is the message missing somewhere here? But people will people. It's really easy because we don't know the XS and nose. It's just never one thing, you know, there's always a mixed bag when things go wrong, and when they go as wrong as they did yesterday, it's it's never one thing. And maybe a young quarterback

needs more than forty snaps in preseason. See this is, this is and I love this argument. It's not an argument to me, but he's not wrong. But just from my standpoint of being the former personnel guy, I cannot find a player if he gets hurt in the preseason. I know. I'm sorry. I know. And I love you, Mickey, I really do. And I love everybody that wants to argue the point of and I shouldn't say argue, discuss the point of why you play guys in preseason. I

get it. It's the most nerve wracking thing for Will McClay or any of those personnel guys to sit there and watch a game and No, all of a sudden, you got a guy, you got Jordy Nelson laying on the field, or you've got one of these guys. You've got somebody that you have laying on the field that you're not gonna have for the regular season. Quick to your point, Travis Frederick's out in that last part of preseason, he's still out. Zach's hurt, right, they're saving Tyran. I

understand I'm saying they should have played him. I'm just saying. Even Tony Romo, late in his career, said in preseason, I want to play an away game. I want to make sure I remember all the different checks. Oh there's got into no questions on the road where there's no yes. And and we're talking a quarterback that's played two seasons. Yeah yeah, and we're just expecting him to go out and perform as if he's a salty veteran. But see, that's where I think that we should It's hard, I know, Mickey,

but that shouldn't we expect that from him. I'm talking about salty ven I'm not talking about the guy Fitzpatrick that lit the Saints up yesterday. I'm talking about a guide's play thirty three starts, thirty three starts. I mean, if this was something and where it's Mahomes out there and he's making mistakes and instead of throwing four touchdowns, he throws four interceptions. I get it. But this is a this is a guy that's played thirty thirty some

odd games. Just seemed to be those first several possessions seem to be a lot of confusion. They took a delay a game, right, Oh sure they did. Yeah, And that's when that's your point about personnel, and that's the that's you put on the coaches. Sideline management, game management. You know, we haven't even gotten into it, and I hope we do a little bit. Why did he punt? Why did he punt the ball and fourth down with three timeouts in a in a two minute warnings? Do

that right now? Let's holding the call. We got Cameron holding real quick. Just we were debating that on the sideline Bank of America Stadium. I thought my gut reaction was, you got three timeouts, you got the two minute warning, your defense is playing well, yeah, and if you give them the ball back at midfield, essentially they just need to hit one play, yeah, and they're in field goal range, or they can run out the clock essentially, yeah, and get or get me two scores on you at that point.

I think you and I were an agreement on that one. Mick, what do you think I applauded it when it happened, going Forth said, good, be aggressive. Yeah, you're halfway there. This team is having trouble drive in the field. So you're assuming if you stopped them and you got the ball back, say the fifteen twenty yard line, that you were going to drive all the way down field. When they struggled offensively the entire game except for one drive.

It's a tough call to risk either way. See that's where that's where I look at the defense and I say, you know what, my guys are playing pretty damn good right now. If I could get a stop here, I'm gonna get the ball. I'm trying to prevent myself from having to drive eighty yards. That's what I'm trying to prevent. I'm trying to drive fifty yards. I'm not trying to drive eighty. But I I'm thinking, well, it got Tavon Austin as a returner. Maybe he could get me some

fuel position here. Maybe they have a shank. Heck, they had a bad snap on a fuel goald or you know, an extra point. You never know in that situation. But I if my offense is struggling, I'm trying to give them the shortest path to getting a score. Well, they were halfway there, but am I right? Yeah, but you go, but you gave the ball. You gave the ball to to Carolina and then they were able to kind of punch you into now their their punner made a stupid That was stupid on their part for him to punt

the ball into the end zone. That was stupid. I mean that almost that almost back gave him a shot the ball back. Yeah, but but the field position, when you're not driving the ball well enough, and the fact that you're defense. If they're handing the ball to McCaffrey he fumbled earlier in the game, who's to say you

don't all of a sudden strip the ball there. I I just I know there's a lot of ifs, But if you're struggling on offense, give me the ball at potentially the fifty yard line and let me go that route instead of going eighty yards with minimal time. I just I don't I don't. I didn't like it. I don't, And you know, I think that I'm critical of him not knowing the condition of his team and he he should have realized that his defense was playing well enough. I think he did, but I think he also realized

the offense wasn't driving the field. Yeah, but one time, how many possessions? No, that's what I'm saying. But Mickey, if they were halfway there, but if they punt the ball, you're if you're you're if you're halfway there, you know, I mean you're you. I don't know. I just you could flip a coin on that, which I didn't. I didn't. I just didn't like it because they usually burned timeouts and I'm kind of was proud of him for having all three timeouts in that situation plus a two minute warning.

I was like thinking, Okay, he's got this thing set up. Now find a way to get the ball back. We would be remiss if we didn't mention the punter was awfully good. Yeah, Chris Jones, Yeah he was. And did he average like almost fifty yards a punt? Yeah? He was forty eight, And I would have trusted him to put the ball right onside the four yard line one more time. He penned him twice. Carolina's putter did it

three times. He's one of the best putters in the league when it comes to you know, but most of his flip flaps were inn at the fifteen. Well, but if he's putting from the from his own fifty, maybe he can get it down inside the I'm just that's just me. And it wasn't a hindsight move because I was we were in there and I was screaming at the TV, don't don't go for this, don't go for this. See and I was doing the opposite. Okay, I was yelling to go for it. It's fair. You guys disagree often.

I love us well so great. I just want him to be aggressive. Worried about the kicker already that was going to happen. You knew that that was one hundred dollars bet in Vegas. They was gonna miss it. Yeah, forty seven years absolutely, you knew just the whole thing that happened around when that whole thing went down, What

do you think about that? My initial thought was they were trying to trade Mayor and they kept him on the roster and couldn't get it done, and they said, let's give a couple more days, Bailey, just go home sitting, and then we'll resign you. And then when I saw him work out for the Jets, I said, oh, so much for my theory. But Jason used a word in the press conference the first time. Confidence. Yes, yeah, he answered the questions. It was about confidence. And it wasn't

their conf fidence in him. I think it was his confidence in himself, right, And I think they saw something that scared him and they said, let's give Mirror every chance he can to prove he can do this right, because he punted basically in three of the four I mean kicked three of the four preseason games right, right, And then in practice he was kind of taken over and it's like, whoa what. We tried to watch, but we didn't watch as well enough. I didn't. We didn't.

I didn't chart it like I chart Bailey. And that's that's that's a lesson I've learned going forward. You know, don't don't assume anything. I don't think I don't think he out kicked Bailey in training camp. It might have been close to a tie. I just think there was something they saw in Dan Bailey that scared him, and

it didn't have anything to do with money. I think that that whole thing about money, because I saw somebody nationally all go pay the guy that's your kick or he's doot a die, and it's like, Okay, that's fine for you to say that, but you weren't around watching the whole deal, all right. One last caller, Cameron in California, got to be kind of quick, what's on your mind? Hey, how you doing guys? Hey, welcome back Mick. But you know, you guys didn't even let us know when you're like

on your way back again. But like when when were you on the chords, you know, or anything like that. You know, you didn't do it all done back? Well, welcome back, Thank You's got a couple of comments, uh Dak. You know, he seemed like he had the yips, like like he just wasn't quite you didn't see the field like he was a yeah, I mean it was obviously just hadn't played, so I wasn't. I'm not too worried about it. I mean, the cup's kind of half bull there.

But the other thing is is Connor held up pretty well. Yeah, but on his technique, he got techniques by by short time he got to pull through there. Yeah, on the sack, but he held up pretty well. I wasn't too worried about that. But Lee, I had never missed league. I never seen Lee missed a tackle like Keith. I mean he got truck one time by a little guy, and then he just took the wrong angles a couple of times,

which I never see Lee do. I mean, that's just I just feel like this was just well as anominally games and they were in the game the whole way, So I'm not worried about it. And I see the same thing gets the Giants next week. Ye, then I'll be a little concerned. So I felt good. You were right on the money there, Brian with uh with will be able to be run run up that defense and and and we could miss the time. So um, you guys are dead on right, great show. Thank you. I'll

let you guys go. Thanks for the call. Lee Lee not playing enough football again there, I can't And Mackey he gets hurt walking ah, I know, I know, And you don't want him in there? No, I don't, and I don't understand. I totally get everybody's preseason argument, because I'm sure we watched a lot of teams yesterday play people that looked awful, just awful. And you know, this is one of one other thing about theF but remember

we saw a lot of them pulling. We didn't see that as much and set the second half though, that's when we saw it. That's what I would have done, right. That was to protect Connor. It was protect Looney tight ends too. Yeah down, yeah, because they're good at it. Yeah, sudden, straight ahead. We'll see that this week. Get ready, Okay, we'll find out. And we got four more days to talk about it. Yeah, talking Cowboys. Got the Scott Snowpook coming up later today to check it out in Dallas.

Mickey's column coming up, and Jason Garrett will speak later. The break is next. Thanks to Kent and William for producing. We'll talk to you guys small. Keep your eyes wide open. This has been a production of Dallas Cowboys dot Com and the Dallas Cowboys Football Club.