The following.
He is a production of Dallas Cowboys dot Com and the Dallas Cowboys Football Club. No Cowboys this, he's Talking Cowboys, straining live from the Dallas Cowboys World Course at the Star in Frisco Street.
Six second, let's got kid twenty textdown and now your hosts Isaiah Standback, Nick Harris, John Mashoda and Kyle Yeomans.
No song this week, Just disappointment. That's all we've got. Forty two to ten was the final score on Sunday Night Football. The Dallas Cowboys fall forty two to ten. I'll say it again to the San Francisco forty nine.
Ers, don't say it again.
The largest loss of the Mike and Mike McCarthy era, not only in terms of of point differential thirty two. But I don't remember a game that I was more excited about in the regular season as a measuring stick for this football team, and one that ended in such disappointment. But we're gonna talk about it here over the next forty five minutes. Glad you're with us here on Talking Cowboys, Presented by a Black Rifle Coffee Company, the official coffee
of the Dallas Cowboys. We needed that black rival this morning to Hissaiah standback, Nick Harris, Nick, when did you guys land last night?
We landed at about three forty eight am and back they're just again safe case and I think I rolled back into my crib right at about four nineteen. So yeah, win fornight, full night sleep, yeah, yeah, no kidding, no kidding, mornings.
Did you get a lick of sleep on the plane or were you just.
Now, I can't sleep on if I'm moving, I cannot sleep, But like I'm if I'm still, I could sleep on this podcast table.
Like, as long as I'm.
Still, I can sleep. But if I'm moving, it's not gonna happen. So yeah, I kick back and watch the Scream six. It was probably one of the worst movies I've ever seen in my life, and it just kind of it wrapped up the night perfectly, honestly sweet.
Yeah. Yeah, it wasn't. It wasn't a good one.
It at least succeeded my expectations.
Oh, jab jab, let's talk about that.
I mean, the expectations were certainly there. A loss in this game three and two. We're talking about this in a much different light.
I think if it ended in.
A competitive loss, and there's no moral victories in football. We've talked about that before, and I mean there is a moral victory and not getting embarrassed. And that's what happened on prime time television with the entire nation watching. San Francisco won in all three phases and they just got the job done from the jump, where Isaiah, the Dallas Cowboys did not, No, you didn't.
We just sat here last week and we talked about everything under the sun.
One of the things that we.
Talked about was the last two times these teams face each other and how Dallas keep it one hundred. Dallas got punched in the mouth, physically handled, and everybody wanted to turn their attention towards the scores, as if the scores were the ultimate, uh, you know, dictator of the result on the field, you know, in terms like the physicality. And it's not always about that, right we say, you know, I'm always talking about the stat line, and it's not.
You know, sometimes it tells the story. Sometimes it does it a lot of times it just adds adds a little color to what's going on. But the stat line tells one heck of a story from last night, the physicality tells one heck of a story from last night.
And you didn't right your wrongs.
The areas that you struggled in previously you struggled in again, And that is the more unfortunate aspect, even more so of the loss.
It wasn't that you you can handle losing to a really good.
Opponent, but when you've lost to the same opponent three times and you haven't corrected the things that you struggled with, that's when you have a problem.
Yeah, and it feels like you're going backwards. Yeah too, in a big way. It felt like four steps back yesterday, like not even two. And I don't see any step forward afterward. I mean, the run game was pitiful. I think Tony Pollard had his worst game as Dallas Cowboy. Dak Prescott, you could arguably say, had his one of
his worst games as Dallas Cowboy. And we've talked about this offense, and I think I had specifically come out after the Arizona game and I was worried because I don't feel like this offense is built to come from behind, and man, did we see that yesterday. It's forcing things, it's trying to make that quick game. The entire game.
And when you're down two scores and you're trying to get ahead with that methodical short movement, it's not gonna work, and it's gonna eventually force you to force things.
And that's what we saw.
And then by the end of it, the bend turned into instead of a break, just like an absolute incineration. It was just interception, tipball, another interception. Oh okay, and it didn't get a first out on this drive. Well, that's happened before, So I meant I was. I was disappointed my expectations, not only for you know, what this team could be, but just the season overall, coming out of yesterday much different than they were going into it.
I was really disappointed. And Kyle heard me the whole entire game. It's true. I guess I get frustrated because the end.
Yeah, because I watched I watch a ton of film, right, and you know, we have a segment here during the week that I try to bring a little bit of expectations, right, a little bit more insights so people understand what to look for and what not to do against an opponent. And there wasn't any surprises, you know, like when you watch film and you have the analytics and you have everything that you need, and he's like, you go into a game, You're like, Okay, guess what, maybe just maybe
you know, I expect them. What did I say last week? I said, in the first half, you can expect to see some things you haven't seen. But eventually they're going to settle into just because of the tree lance thing. And you face them through two times already, like they might throw some curve balls out there, there were no curve balls.
I mean offensively, yes, they have some curve balls.
They always are going to because their offense is that is just that good, right, Everything that they do offensively looks exactly the same, and that's kudos to their outfit out there. Defensively, my disappointment level from Dallas's offense against San Francisco forty nine ers defense.
Was at all time high.
It was at all time high because these were the most simplistic defensive looks that you could ever hope for in a professional football game.
Cover one, cover two.
Sometimes they took a robber on the backside safety and double team CD. You expected that, right, Everything that we've talked about through the film sessions and on here and everything else that we've said was going to be open was there. But yet you still are forcing things and we said, we also said on here that you can't keep this style of offense versus their style of defense and expect to be successful. Now you're going to have
to take shots. You can't run West Coast offense, quick game route concepts versus press man versus road cover two. And yet we saw there, especially in the second half, how the ball just kept going where it should not. And that's where my frustration lies because that was a version of deck that we saw last year. That was the deck we saw last year when you're forcing things
into coverages that you're not supposed to throw into. Right, I'm sitting there watching the game giving coverage calls from the TV cut right, and I'm like, can't go there?
Ope went there.
And just to back up Isaiah's point here, it was pre snap, Isaiah would say the look, he would look at the coverage, the throw would be made, and as soon as the throw was leaving his hand, he I could hear Isaiah just saying no, no, no, no no pick, nope, no no no no passperay cup.
I mean, that's what it ends up being.
And So when you're looking at it from that standpoint, and it's simplistic enough from a read quarterback wise former quarterback in the TV copy, imagine.
What it looks like on the field.
Yeah, it's different if there's a bird's eye view versus field field level view. But if you're still able to see it like that, then why is QB one unable to do so?
I don't, I don't know. I can't speak to that call, and I don't. I don't want to just to turn into a dack dragon.
And it's not all.
It's not all. Let's call it one.
And I mean the things that I feel like I say on here, on any other platform, I whole hardly feel like I could stand behind I could see I see coach McCarthy every week.
Okay, I see him. I shake his hand, I say what's up to him?
Like I.
He did not call a good game. He didn't. He did not call his best game.
He admitted that too.
Yeah, I believe he did not call a good game.
This They did not change what they had been doing, and unfortunately, West Coast offense is not complex enough to run the same things with the same looks.
You have to mix things up.
You have to mix up personnel groupings, you have to mix up motions, you have to mix up formations. You can run the same offense, but it has to look different, and it didn't look different. There weren't enough wrinkles where these guys were soft. That was in the middle of the field, underneath, and you saw that on the drive
that Dallas was successful. Where was the ball going dumped down little hitch under middle on the middle right, taking with the defense, Taking with the DEFENSEI give this was a bend, but don't break defense when they're playing too high safety, when they're playing one high safety.
Take your shots.
The times where Dallas took their shots, the balls were bad, timing was off protection. Something was always wrong right, And that's been the story this year when they've tried to push the ball down the field. But I just felt like there were plenty of opportunities, especially when the game started to get out of hand, to work your way back into it if you understood what the coverages were. And I honestly think as bad as the stat line shows a running game, I don't think the running game
was that bad. Matter of fact, I felt like the running game was actually relatively good early on in the game when you were actually giving it to your running backs, like they were moving the ball, but.
Then they got out of it.
I mean they had like two yards on the first four drives. I don't, I don't. I don't feel that there.
I hear you, I hear you.
Right, So the stat line and the stat line shows one thing. But as you watched the game, so had two carries on the first one exactly.
One of them was a fumble, and it was more true, Like I'm just but I think that's that's part of it, win way. Yeah, it went away from it after the fumble saying oh, oh, we can't give the ball up.
That's a ball security thing. That has nothing to do with the yardage.
It's it's still part of the run game.
Absolutely, it's part of the ram.
But guess what you had to You had to trust your guys that they're not going to do that again or put another back in, you know what I'm saying. But like you can't if that was a positive play before the punch out, it was a positive.
Play, right, they probably had like seven yards.
That's a positive play.
It was the most positive at that point, you know what.
I'm saying like I'm taking like three four yards on the ground against against San Franz.
I'm taking it. I'm taking it all day long. Everybody's looking for the big splash plays.
We would love to see the big splash place Tony Poller, big splash plays.
Pollard had three point six yards per carry at the end end of the night. Yeah, it wasn't like he did anything down the stretch.
Either, that really was it?
Like eight carries for twenty nine, yeah, eight for twenty nine.
But I come out from a standpoint where you have to keep them even. Yeah, you can't.
You don't have an offense that you can just sit back and throw the ball. We've talked about that. I've talked about this extensively since I've touched down here, Kyle, that Dak's not I just sit back and throw the ball quarterback.
That's just not his thing. That's not to say that he can't do it. It's not his thing.
He is best when he has a running game, and you have to run the ball in order to have him be effectives as effective as you want him to be, and you just didn't.
We talked about it after the Jets game.
How the time of the time of possession allowed that defense to really settle in and have such a good effort. You could say the same about the Giants game as well. I looked up with twelve minutes to go in the second quarter, and by this point, I believe it was already fourteen nothing and the Niners had had the ball twelve and a half minutes out of the first sixteen and a half minutes. And look, I understand the defense
gave up forty two points yesterday. I understand that even in the second half there were no adjustments made and they were just brock Party. Looked like Tom Brady for a minute, he was dicing up their zone coverages. It felt like a third and fourteen was a third and two. But I have to give a lot of this criticism towards the offense. Yesterday. The defense tried to hold their own in the first half. They forced a turnover after
Tony Poller's fumble. Jordan Lewis rips Christian McCaffrey, amazing play. You know, you kind of feel like that's going to turn the tides. And then another three now and defense makes a stop to keep it. I believe it was fourteen to seven offense can't do it. Offense can't make anything happen out of it. They can't cut it to even fourteen to ten, and then San Fran goes down
and scores before the half twenty one to seven. And then the offense, okay, another opportunity here, we can dive back into the game coming out of the break, three points and then another touchdown.
And then that's where they just broke.
I just when the defense is on the field for that long and then the injury starts sacking on top of that, that's when it becomes really difficult this offense. I feel like the loss is really built around that. It starts there. The defense definitely has some responsibility, don't get me wrong, but the offense, that's where the loss starts for me.
Yeah, I think the defense had chances to switch the game and set the tone. I mean the first one was the opening drive, the fact that they had a chance, and we talked about the coin toss last week. What would you rather do? I would rather have my highly vaulted defense out on the field first have a chance to get the ball back, and instead they just let up a long linked The methodical drive left a wide open George Kittle for a touchdown, and it opened the game in a way of uh oh, here we go.
Here's San Francisco again. One of the best offenses in football right now, working like one of the best offenses against our defense that's supposed to.
Be one of the best in football.
And then you had the chance to turn the tide. In the middle of the second quarter. You went down finally got points on the board, a big time drive from Dak Prescott. The play calling was good. They took what the defense gave them. They were able to work down the field. Cavante Turpin then takes the top off, goes over the top of the defense. A great ball from Dak Prescott hits Turpin for six. Boom, fourteen to seven.
Feel pretty good at that point, Feel pretty good if your defense gets back out there with decent field position. It was from the twenty five. You got a chance there, But then you had the third down and four of the two penalties the unsportsmanlike conduct, yeah, suck, and the taunting penalty over the top from jay Ron Curse. The curse one I don't have as much problem with because I went back and looked at it. He was taunting and it's pretty clear and concise. That's a bad play
from jay Ron Curse. I don't like the call on Donovan Wilson on the fact that they called it on jay Ron Curse too, but it was Donovan Wilson on the unsportsmanlike conduct. I thought it was a clean hit, great hit. TV copy thought it was a clean hit. All twenty two went back and looked at it. I thought it was a clean hit as well. I didn't like that, but then Curse over the top would have ruined it regardless. Yeah, either way, offense for San Francisco
stays on the field. You drive down the field, you score twenty one to seven, and just deflation and nothing.
They never respinded. Yeah, there was no punching back.
You had a chance even after the third and four penalty, and the drive was kept alive to say all right, let's bow up here again and get a stop, and you didn't do that. So as much as I agree with Nick, I think it does start with the offense. And I've got more stats on the wide receivers coming up in the second segment. I do think the defense was very much so at fault on the fact that they had chances with you to take this game back.
And they never did.
Nine drives yesterday ended without a first down, nine offensive drives five to three and ounce and four turnovers.
Six at the first seven in the first half.
Right, yeah, oh yeah, yeah, I mean so eight first downs total.
San Francisco had eight when I looked up, like four minutes into the game.
San Francisco had twenty five on the night. Dallas had an average of two first downs per quarter. Yeah, man, the average of two first downs record, that tells the story.
Yeah, it does.
It wasn't It just wasn't good, man, No, it wasn't good. One hundred and ninety seven total yards.
Total total.
It's the third three interception game by Dak Prescott.
They were bad interceptions though.
Yeah, the tip ball happens, but we've talked about that before.
But but he threw it into a back coverage.
It would be different if the whole rhetoric around this offense was over the offseason was about not having those tip balls happen, you know, it'd be different. It was if it was like a one off that we didn't see six times last year.
However, many times there were three bad interceptions. Sometimes it was interceptions. All three of them were. They were terrible, like terrible.
All three of them were poor decisions too.
It's not like there was even one like even the downfield ball, it was double coverage.
Chucked up. He chuck it up there forcing chuck it up.
Hope it was a hope.
Yeah, we have a good sample size on this offense. I feel like we're five games in. Yeah, I don't think there's any excuse using or sugar coating at this point.
Like this is what the product is, apparently what it's going to be.
This offense, that's what's scary.
And uh yeah, Texas Coast not looking great.
South Padre is like the one beach I like kind of appreciate in Texas, and that's the quart I feel like that was that turbine drive yesterday.
It was like, yeah, there's tough Padre.
And then you get up to Corpus and you're like, okay, there's not a lot here, and then Galveus and you're like, oh my god, please, and then that's where the three picks happen.
And then then you get to Bamont and you're like, oh my god. For everybody that did New Orleans.
Listening, to this show in the coast on the Gulf Coast of Texas.
Where were we apologize?
Right?
I love the state of Texas, it's it's my home. I love this place. But we have some of the worst beaches on the planet. It's horrible. It's the one thing we don't have.
I can tell you that more like Texas toast.
All right, when we come back, let's let's dive into this offense, offensive line, back and healthy. It didn't look the way that you anticipated it either. Dak Prescott had pressure on them all day long. What went wrong up front? And why are the wide receivers struggling to gather separation? Let's talk about that right after this with more talking cowboys. Following the forty two to ten loss to San Francisco.
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Welcome back into Dear Doctor, the show where I answered life's questions with an ice cold can of doctor Pepper. Sheila, let's hear from my next caller.
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To Talking Cowboys. Back here on Talking Cowboys, presented by Black Rifle Coffee Company, the official coffee of the Dallas Cowboys. This portion of the show is also brought to you by Quaker Oat.
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Had mine, Did you yep? Needed them today? Definitely?
Absolutely. By the way, if you're like me and your sports team lets you down. I like to be with like minded people. I like to tune in too shows like this one, by the way, and I like to to just get my air out the dirty laundry right, air it out. Eight one seven two nine zero three two nine eight is our text line. We're not going to take any calls today. That's for tomorrow. Trust me, we will take clin of calls tomorrow.
But thumb's working.
Yeah, get the text messages. We'll answer some text here in a minute eight point seven two nine zero three two nine eight, and just give us your thoughts on the game. Was what was the most disappointing side of it, what surprised you the most?
And where do we go from here?
Speaking on where do we go from here, the Cowboys had not had their starting offensive line their best five for six hundred and thirty days. Six hundred and thirty days. Last time the Cowboys had their best five available and starting in a football game was the wild Card round against San Francisco in twenty twenty one. Well, they had all five up there, Tyron Smith at left tackle, Tyler Smith at left guard, Tyler Biada Shitz center, even though he was banged up, he re entered into the game.
Then you go from there into Zach Martin, Terrence Steele, Nick When you looked at the offensive line yesterday, I mean, it wasn't perfect upfront eye or I mean, what went wrong for them? Or was it just San Francisco's too good of a front seven.
I will say as a as a prologue here, I typically go back and watch trench work a little bit more in my in my second watch, and I haven't had the opportunity to do my second watch yet, but on initial initial watch, seeing it with my own eyes, it didn't look pretty. We start on the offensive side of the ball, Nick Bosa getting home quite a bit, internal pressure getting.
Generated quite a bit.
I feel like Tyron Smith held his own for the most part, and before the offense just completely broke apart. I mean even Zach Martin had some opportunities where his guy got into the backfield. I mean, it was just it was bad up front, and I think that's kind of where things started with having to fall back onto the short game and making everything quick because it made this offense one dimensional. It only gave them one option
moving forward. That defensive line was doing exactly what it has been doing since it's been constructed, and that's get to the quarterback quick, get into the backfield quick, and make things difficult for any sort of action in the backfield. So when that happens, that allows that secondary to be so much more aggressive. You talked about it last week, Isaiah, and that's what it's exactly what happened. And whenever you you forced things two seconds off the snap against an
aggressive secondary, you see what happens. Three turn or three interceptions, one fumble obviously the fumble calls by Fred Warner and man Fred Warner gosh. But game of his life, and he's had a lot of really good games. He was awesome getting into the backfield, affecting the past game, the force fumble, it was.
He was all over the place.
Really really good player that they have on the second level there. I honestly last week I didn't factor him in enough. I didn't factor him in as much as I should have. But clearly Cowboys didn't either.
I got one question from the three to eight and I'll throw this to you, Nick. Has Terrence still taking a step back or has he not just been as good as he was last year at this point?
Yeah, I need to see a little bit more from T. Steel. I'm with you there probably three oh eight.
Granted you're going against Nick Bosa, so I mean the challenge is stiff, but you were just a Player of the Year.
Yeah, but you were just paid, you know, And it's a long term investment.
When you're a long term investment as a tackle, you got to be able to stop those guys. You're not expected to stop those guys every single time. Yeah, he's going to get home. Yeah he's going to get a sack, He's going to get his But Nick Bosa was really he was really disruptive last night.
What did you think about the offensive line? Well, like Nick, I have to go back and watch a little bit more. However, from what I saw just my eyes, and again, I don't want to put too much weight on this. I don't feel like Tyler Smith was his greatest T Steele. I think he was getting his shoulders turn too far to the sideline, and I think that's why Bosa had a short edge a lot of times. I could be
able to give a little bit more detail. Obviously I have to to take a little bit deeper dive, but you know, holistically, I think they again, they just lost that battle on the trenches. And you can't lose the battle on the trenches against the forty nine ers, you just you just can't. Those guys are just too good on their front line. And once you once those guys consume your office a lineman, you can't reun the ball. And if you can't stop their defensive ends, and you're
you're gonna have one heck of a long day. And that's exactly what it was.
Yeah, I mean, this was a setup that we thought going into it that was gonna allow Dak Prescott to have more time to throw that There was gonna be more time for Dak to drop back and possibly force it downfield, or not force it downfield. You didn't want him to do that, so it ended up happening, but it looked like they were gonna at least have something downfield for Dak Prescott. Instead, it was quite the opposite. And I've got some stats.
Here as long as I can find it, I think I actually.
Went away from it. I'll go back to it.
So it was separation. This is via next gen stats separation from.
The wide receivers yesterday.
On twenty six targets for both Michael Gallup and Ceedee Lamb, Michael Gallup had an average separation of one point nine yards.
They had twenty six targets between the two of them.
Not targets routes.
Oh righty did I say targets. I'm meant to say routes.
Out of twenty six twenty six routes for Michael Gallup and twenty six routes for Ceedee Lamb, Gallup had one point nine yards on average separation one point nine under two. Ceedee Lamb had two point six, which was the best out of the wide receiver group. Brandon Cooks was the worst out of the three one point three yards of separation.
You want to know where all three of those guys would have ranked on the pass catchers list for the San Francisco forty nine ers yesterday would have ranked one, two, four, five, seventh, and eighth out of the wide receivers. In the pass catchers, Kyle Uschak had four point three, so he had even more. Christian McCaffrey, George Kittle had more. Of course Brandon, I you o, Samuel even Juwan Jennings had five point eight yards per separation.
George Separation broke a world record in that department list only two point eight.
Oh really, but.
Still, I mean, yeah, for tight end, it's really good. I will give credit where credit is due. Jake Ferguson had four point seven. So if there was a pass catcher you could rely on, it was Jake Ferguson. But my question now turns to why aren't these wide receivers getting open? And where can you fix that the quickest?
Because the routes are simplified.
Everything here is so simple, and we heard it over the offseason in a positive connotation, but I think it's starting to take a negative one. Everything's quick, everything's right across the middle. I'll say, I was going through next Gen stats last week, right and it has the really good five column look on where the targets have been for Dak Prescott through the first four games.
He's only had I believe.
It was four attempts right down the middle of the field. And I'm sitting here and I'm looking at this west coast style offense, where you know, you got a lot of routes coming across each other. Why you're not hitting guys in stride and it's waiting till everything is past developed and you're hitting guys more on the boundary. Doesn't give them opportunity to do anything out of it. And that was over complicated yesterday. Am I looking at it wrong?
There?
I know, I think you're looking at it right, which is why Isaiah is just kind of quiet over here. Does it just come down the timing then? Is it just timing?
Is that all that's off? It's not. No, that's not all it's off.
It's what guys have been subjected to running in terms of the route concepts. And to your point, the routes are more simplified, and that's okay as long as you mix up the the alignment of the receivers, as long
as you mix up the concepts. Like the route tree is the route tree, right, There's some are more complex than others, but for the majority of the I mean, there's probably you know, sixteen to twenty routes an entire route tree, right, They've it's expanded since the origination of football. But uh, but I mean, for the most part, they're just not being utilized properly. You know, was it film Room last week or was it film one of those special edition?
It was Film Room.
We talked about the opportunities that were there against the forty nine ers defense and how you could take advantage of them. Drive concepts, shallows. I think there's one time where I think there's a whip route that was ran, that was actually completed yesterday. Those are man beaters, red routes, those concepts you weren't seeing it. You like to push the ball down the field if you're facing man and
man coverage. You know, there's rollerways, there's comebacks, there's double moves, There's a whole lot of things that you can get to. But then again, the protection aspect comes into it. But one thing that this offense has not done successfully that they have done successfully over recent years has pushed the ball down the field. And that comes because of the
standpoint of your running the West Coast. But that comes right back to it I said last week, the West Coast is not going to work against the forty nine ers. Like I knew that much, right, I knew that I was you're talking to somebody who ran the West Coast, like West Coast versus press Man and cover two. It's not it's not the jam unless you're running it out a bunch of formation, right, and you're running different spacing concepts and things of that nature.
So didn't happen. Didn't happen?
You try to run your traditional offense and you got your traditional butt kicked.
I would I would challenge anyone to go back on the film last night and try to find at least ten routes. Run at least ten you can. You could choose whoever we could. We can combine them.
Oh yeah, shallow.
There was a hitch corner was a hitch one route. I got five.
There was a hitch across the middle to Pauler for a first down. I believe it was the first first down that was. That was like, oh, that was cool. It was across the middle.
It was frustrating because the Nayden Kyle probably so sick of me. I was literally just true like saying, like what concepts work versus what coverages?
Don't throw it at s land it gets covered too, gains covered two.
Right.
I started talking about the dagger concept and when you're in a three point one versus Cover two, Like, this is how you find the hole in the cover two. Once Dallas got behind, I was like, this is these are the gaps in the defenses. This is what you're going to see, right, so you get out there pre snap breed. This is our alignment. Okay, boom, all right, it looks good, looks like it looks like two, looks like we're gonna get it. This is the route that works,
and you don't get to it. Flip the script, go to the other side. Rock Perty sitting back to it all the time in the world. What route concepts do we see? Kyle, We run cover two the same exact concepts that I was saying will work against against them. I was just about to say that was working against Dallas. You know, it's the game's not It's not a complicated, at least against the forty nine ers their scheme, it wasn't complicated. Steve Wilks as good as a defensive coordinator
he is. They did not get in their bag yesterday.
They don't have to be.
They don't have to They played very simplicity things.
They just run it really well, and I think there were opportunities that Dallas just didn't take take advantage of yesterday, and it's really unfortunate. And I know, I know coach McCarthy's super competitive. I know he's probably harder on himself than anybody. I know he's going to get this thing corrected. And he has a wealth of knowledge and they can open up the playbook. They just didn't do it last night.
It was frustrating in a number of occasions offensively. And maybe it's the play calling, maybe it's the scheme, maybe it's the confidence.
Level and a lot of things.
But right now, I wish we could answer all of these questions on the text line, by the way, and I like.
That, and I don't want to just so I know we've talked about Dak, We've talked about I mean, so the offensive line, Like everybody has a pardon this. I just want to make that very clear. When you lose, everybody has to look in the mirror. Oh and like some of the things that happened yesterday, like people see the punch out from On Warner right on Tony Pollard and say, man, come on Tony Pollard. Well, in reality and when you go back and look at the play
and you break it, down, you can go slow motion. Well, Warner actually had somebody who was actually assigned to him, and that person got to him unimpeded. That was Tyler Biyatis. Bayati's worked all the way up to Fred Warner grabbed him and he got thrown out the club, literally thrown out the club by a two hundred and forty pounds linebacker. Just threw him on his butt like he was like tissue paper and it went out. Proceeded to continue working his butt off and goes and punches the ball out.
So somebody makes a play when they were actually had somebody assigned to them, the person got to them, that person didn't execute their.
Assignment because that took place all of a sudden. It's a turnover, right.
So when I say, like holistically, you have to be able to pull back and look at the entire picture. You can't just look at what was the end result of the play. Like everybody plays a part in this and that was a complete collapse last night, from the execution on the field to the play calling in the booth.
And that goes on both sides.
Yes, you talk about looking in the mirror, I think my mind jumps to three guys, Mike McCarthy and Dak are the first two, and I feel like they go with each other for reasons we've talked about on the show already. Mike McCarthy. They've got to complicate the play calling a little bit more. They need a little bit more multiplicity in this offense. There's got to be some juice added, because I can't honestly look at one thing that I've seen offensively so far this season it's like, Yeah,
that's juice, That's that's something you can build upon. I really haven't. I really haven't. Third guy's jay Ron Curst. Offensively, He's he's had a rough year so far. Yeah, rough year. Yeah, that's that's definitely part of it. But but man, yeah he's had a rough part and honorable mentioned Cdee Lamb and in a season where he's trying to vibe for a top contract extension and to be paid as a top receiver in the NFL. When you're at a twenty one seven type game in the third quarter, you got
to show up. You know, you've got to be able to get open and and you know, make it easy for your quarterback. And I don't. I don't feel like he did that last night. We've talked about body language on the show. It was at an all time work, all time low last night and the post game availability, he was still pretty frustrated.
And and I am assure that and I saw that right, But like it's not all on him all that.
I mean, this route is not what it's been right now, It's not what it's been in the in Kellen Moore's system.
Ceedee Lamb's gonna have a lot more plays. It was built on, this was predicated on.
This offense is not And to your point, yes, they have to open up the playbook and find a way to get your playmakers the ball. Ceedee Lamb and Brandon Cooks should be getting the ball, not freaking schoon maker.
I'm sorry, no disrespect, you know what I'm saying, Like I just said.
That studio on third down and long while we're throwing a seam up the right Pashmark to schoon mad.
You know what I'm saying, Like, no disrespect, but like, come on, man, Like you have some highly talented receivers, use them, and there's so many ways that you can use them, but you just earned you haven't, at least to date, haven't got creative enough with your formations, with your motions and your ships to put these guys in matchup advantages.
Third and six in the third quarter, still in a game that you can win, and you run the ball against press man right coming out of the gates. There's just so many plays. You can go back and you can circle and say why. I mean, that's it, that's just why. All right, let's take our second break. When we come back, we're gonna try and answer as many questions as we can, because I just counted them up. We have forty one texts.
Thank you all.
Since the show starts rapid fire, Yeah, we might rapid fire this thing. You could still throw in your questions eight one seven two nine zero three two nine eight more talking cowboys.
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Bad to Talking Cowboys. This segment is brought to you by in Visi Line, the official smile of the Dallas Cowboys, and also brought to you by the Dallas Cowboys Fan of the Year, presented by Captain Morgan. We could always use the little Captain Morgan this morning. Put it in the black rifle coffee. Make it work all right? Cowboys lose forty two to ten to the San Francisco forty nine Ers in Week five. I said it last night, this one's a tough one to swallow. But the sun
did come up this morning. There are still twelve games left. The season is by no means over all you know from yesterday is that there is a lot of work to do for this team to legitimately be considered a contender, and they're gonna have to win some big games before you can really give them the contender title again. I think that's where we're at right with this team.
I feel like everybody else on your schedules is getting stronger too. It looks like it.
Yeah.
I mean, if what we've seen so far this Jekyl and Hide type team. I think about the teams they beat. What have those teams done?
Not a whole lot.
You look at the remaining schedule. You got to jump around and go right back to LA next week to play the Chargers. That's a really good opponent. You gotta go to Buffalo, you gotta go to Miami, you got to play Philly twice. I mean, it doesn't look it doesn't look strong. I kind of talked about it last night in my five takes article, and I think I'm probably gonna talk about it Nick Knight quite a bit this week. The next fourteen days are going to determine
a lot with what happens with this team. This team doesn't have an identity right now, and if they can't find it in the next fourteen days, and I don't feel like they will a really really good opponent that they're gonna have to turn around and face next Monday night. It's a really good opportunity about back. But it's also a really good opportunity to get stumped once again. And that's a and then you get the bye week, and I think the bye week, oddly enough, it comes at a good time.
It actually works.
It actually comes at a good time. Before the season started, I was like, that's a terrible draw.
By week now you're like, wow, thank goodness, that thing is coming. Yep, all right, let's wrapid fire some questions. I'm going to bunch out of the forty five now it's up to like fifty five. Since the text messages keep rolling in nine zero three, two, nine eight, A lot of them are about Dak Prescott and your confidence level in QB one, so real quickly does your confidence level waiver or has it wavered? And where does it sit going into Week six?
Keeping it real, Keeping it real?
Yeah, my chest, you know me.
My confidence level has always been pretty much the same, and my expectation of Dak has always been pretty much the same.
I think what he's doing has been his issue.
I don't think he's a peer drop back quarterback, and I think that he gets frustrated and tries to force things outside of skills. I don't think that he sees coverages very well, and I don't think that he's highly accurate when he decides to try to push the ball down the field. That's the Dak that I've been saying ever since Andy Dalden was here. It's the same. It's the same now, all right, And it's unfortunate, but that's been my stance on him, that he has to have a running game.
He has to have play action. Yep.
That's what Dak has to have for him to be uber successful, doesn't It is what it is, right, I mean, people could people are gonna shoot at it.
That's fine. It is what it is.
That's the type of quarterback that you have, So you have to work around his capabilities.
I make this quick.
This is what I texted in my group chat last night, and I have to be careful. Here's probably the only thing I could say about the group chat. I said, I've always been a Dak guy. I've never really gave into the hate. Tonight, I can feel my mindset starting to shift a little bit. And it's not to say that I'm hating Dak. Great, dude, you know that. I think that's not necessary. But I can see a lot of the points that are being made outside of the
building and where the truth is lying within it. He hasn't taken over a game so far this season, and in two games where they really needed him to, he hasn't been able to do that. Because we've seen what Dak looks like at his best, and it's been very far from that early on this year.
Yeah, the last time I can remember looking at it and saying, Wow, Dak is next level was twenty twenty two, or no. Twenty twenty one going into the bye week, prior to the calf injury against New England.
For me, it was twenty twenty before he got hurt. Yeah, before the injury, that was his.
Best see, and that's kind of I've always been a Dak defender too, and we've I mean, we've always kept it real on the show, and we always do and I mean there's a lot of times where I do defend Dak, and I will continue to defend Dak to
a certain extent. But whenever you have games like this, and whenever you have the sample size that you do here in twenty twenty three, where it looks I hate to even say this because I don't even know if this is true, but just from the outside looking in, it looks like he is a completely different cerebral quarterback. His confidence level is almost nothing right now. And whether that's the change in system, whether that's the way that the game plan now structures around him, because I mean,
like Isaiah said, you have to structure around Deck. He is your franchise quarterback. You have made that decision. Whether the scheme has changed something in that confidence level, it doesn't look like the deck that you saw in twenty twenty before the injury, or twenty twenty one before the cap injury, or even at times last year, whenever he could take over a game and throw the ball down the field, I haven't seen that.
Number four, this year.
I haven't seen that from Dak Prescott in twenty twenty three. Doesn't mean we can't doesn't mean that that can't happen and that he can't do that because we've seen it before. But there's got to be some sort of change and some sort of flit switch that needs to be flipped in order to get there, and it's gonna have to happen quickly because if not, you're gonna be exposed, just like you were last night on Sunday Night Football.
I wish he's assistant.
From what I've seen on film, He's gonna just like every other quarterback in this leagu're gonna have your good days, You're gonna have your bad days. Right, last night was a terrible night for Dak, but it was a terrible night in the sense of what he has struggled with in terms of his decision making.
He went right back to it, amplified. Yeah, he went right back to it.
Right.
Everybody was all hype about the interception ratio and all this stuff coming to the game, and I was like, that's the system.
Yeah, Like, that's that's just the system.
Like you literally pick a side, you picked the right side, You're not gonna throw picks last night, he ignored that.
He ignored that.
And you saw what you ran into last year and last year, I don't know how many times we broke down on a film A lot you didn't. He just wasn't seeing coverages and last night coverages. There's certain routes that are just eliminated by the pre snap read press man. Dang can't run that.
That sucks. Two, dang, can't throw it into that. That sucks. Let me go over here now. He ignored that.
He said, Nah, screw that, I'm throwing it anyway. Pick throw it down the field.
I don't care.
There's a safety back there with nobody on him. Pick decision making gets him in trouble.
Yeah, it's funny that you say. It feels almost different surrebray for him.
Well, I almost couldn't say that word. I'm surprised I could got through it. Yeah, I did.
I thought about that last week actually during the Patriots game, because he was hesitating a lot early on. It was like it was like this, but like it didn't end up being negative in that game obviously, But something's in his head.
I don't know.
I'm not going to sit here and theorize what it is, because that's a whole other man with the exactly We're not in his head. I'm not, but it's uh, something's going on there. Yeah, because it feels different than what we've seen. Yeah, even last year. It feels different from because last year at least he was confident in throwing the picks.
Maybe maybe the storylines got to him.
Maybe that's what it was.
And it's it's unfortunate because I do believe Dak can't get there. But we just he's got a long way to go, just like anybody else in this offense. Because it's like we saw said at the beginning of the show, it's not all on for. Nope, it is not all on four. And if you're putting it all on for you're not watching the entire game.
It's an open mind.
There's a lot to fix here, both sides of the football. I said it last night. I mean, there have been times whenever this team's been out coached in specific areas, and I felt like Arizona they were out coached in specific areas. I thought across the board in this matchup, they were completely out coached by Kyle Shanahan staff. Both offensively, defensively, special teams. San Francisco was a better team. They were
a holistic, elite team as a whole sport. There's a long way to go for the Cowboys to be considered elite, to be considered contenders. We could be here for another forty five minutes.
And break this thing.
We could be here for two hours, I feel.
Like, but you know what the positive, Okay, the positive is last night was a measuring stick game.
It was it's early in your season. You know where you staying.
You're not hoping, you're not wishing, you're not thinking, you're not assuming. You know exactly where you are as a team and as an organization right now. Make the changes that are necessary to put yourself in a position at the end of the year.
Yeah.
Much better being week five than week fifteen.
Absolutely, no doubt. That's the positive.
And I mean there were a lot of injuries last night too, so we got a yeah, I got this work. Uh the we got a lot to talk about later in the week as well. We'll be back tomorrow. We're gonna take your calls tomorrow. Hit more of these text messes. I apologize for not being able to get to everyone we.
Appreciate you, guys.
I think we really do appreciate you guys being locked in and communicating and engaging.
We're with you in this one.
Cowboys Nation. We really are talking Cowboys Nation. We're uh, we're here with you.
Nine am. Winter lose is what we do. Winter lose, Keep it real Monday. We kept it real.
Yep, all right, we uh tomorrow morning, nine am, John Michoda, we'll rejoin the show. We'll talk about that a little bit more as well, and then we'll turn the page on Wednesday and look ahead to this Monday night football matchup and a can't chance to.
Rebound going in family reunion.
Huh yeah, a little bit of a reunion, a little bit of a reunion.
Just just to see another bosa.
Yeah, that's the family reunion. Hey bro, let me tell you about this, oh man.
All right, that's that does it for us here on a keep it real Monday for talking to cowboys.
Yeah, we gotta, we gotta get out of here.
Chris Beam, Isaiah standback, Nick Carras and Kyle Yeoman saying so long from the Star in Frisco. We'll see tomorrow with more talking cowboys. This has been a production of dallascowboys dot Com and the Dallas Cowboys football Club