Talkin' Cowboys: Thriller In Tampa

Mortgage Studios at the Star in Frisco. We've got heck Ma Harrison, Isaiah Stanback, Rob Phillips, and Kyle Yeoman's here for the next forty five minutes as we continue to break down the thirty one twenty nine loss. It's the Tampa Bay Buccaneers over the Dallas Cowboys to kick off not only the Cowboys regular season, but the NFL regular season. There were some good, there was some bad, and we're gonna hit all of it and in between here over the course of this show. But glad you're with us here.

Early in the morning nine am Central Time is when we'll get kicked off for the rest of the season, and we will be on every weekday from here on out, which is a lot of fun to have on Dallas Cowboys dot com. Shaken Bay, we are back, but Rob Phillips, I'm gonna let you start things off. Thirty one, twenty nine. It was an instant classic that just came up short for the Cowboys overall last night. The NFL knew what they were doing when they made this matchup. They knew

about the talent on both sides. And I know we've we've we've dissected this team throughout preseason and there's some spots where they're not deep, but at the top of their roster, they've got some big time talent, especially on offense, that can match Tom Brady and this defending champion Bucks team. And they did it. You know that that they got right to the edge, and man, that game reminded me.

I'm sorry to bring the room down heck, but it reminded me of that divisional playoff game against Green Bay in twenty sixteen. Dax rookie year, he's going toe for toe with the legend. Take my heart out one more time? Why don't you no oh that's the Packer game. Yeah, he goes a playoff game here at home. Yeah, he goes toe to toe with the legend. And not only is there's another play where you think you got a

strip sack on the on the quarterback. I don't know how the hell that didn't happen for Dorans Armstrong earlier in the game Jeff Heath against the Packers back then. But you leave just a little bit too much time for Tom Brady and he gets it done. M I'm ticked off this morning. I'm so happy everybody else is in a good morning. I felt that when I walked out this morning, Heck, I didn't even speak to you. You didn't and so I'm telling us about that's This is a hard one. This is just a tough one.

And when you say the NFL knew what they were doing, I think the NFL tried to offer us up to Tampa and they didn't recognize that the Cowboys would come into town and a lot of those questions were going to get answered that we didn't know from the preseason going into the regular season, and I think we realized that, Man, all this talk about Dak and his shoulder was because they were gonna unveil the Holliser on Thursday night and he was gonna have an opportunity to throw it all

over the park. You know. The one thing that really just disappointed me was the fact that we did not at all stay with the running game, and I'm just gonna point that out. That's the one thing about last night that really was man. I was like, what's what's at the end of the first half. I kept saying to myself, are we literally just going to abandon the

run for the rest of the game. But you know, again, it was a great matchup and you're absolutely right, the NFL put to a spectacular first night of action and couldn't be more happy about the production of the NFL last night, but not the outcome. I think last night was positive. I think last night was positive, and that's why I'm not coming to being Debbie Downer. That's why I'm not coming in here. Soul came on my head down and feeling sorry for myself. Last night was a

positive thing. You just faced the World Champions who brought back completely their entire roster and added more depth to that roster, and they had all their firepower already for you. And you went total toll with them last night. You didn't get beat. You lost the game. You did not get beat. You lost that game because you had opportunities to take advantage of that you did not. We miss field goals, we miss big plays. We gave up big plays. Right,

There is coverage, but we had blown coverage assignments. We had bad matchups that we should have never been in d Law versus Grundcows. There's a lot of things in there that we that we had plenty of opportunities to win this game, and we didn't do it. So we lost the game, right, we gave it away. And the fact that you can walk it out of this game for the most part of healthy as far as I know, right, Michael gallops gallops, Yeah, I mean yeah, I'm pretty sure

he'll be okay. Yeah, Right, So we walked out of his game pretty healthy. And we know that we went toe to toe with the complete champions to undoubted champions in this league, aside from you know them in Kansas City. Those are two dogs in this league everybody has to be fearful of. And you know that you gave it away, you should be feeling really good about where you're at right now. Oh and by the way, your first round draft pick is a dog. Michael Parsons was all over

the place. There were some lapses there and he looked lost at times. But you're right. There's no such thing as a more ogal moral victory, no, in the NFL. But there are positives you can take out of a loss, and there were plenty of top positives and one of those was Dak Prescott. I mean, you look at the way that he threw the football around forty two or fifty eight, four hundred and three yards three touchdowns. But I kind of want to keep that in mind when

talking about Heckma's point and abandoning the run. We saw that early there were six rushing attempts in the first half. There were eighteen total for the game. Why was that the case and is that something we can expect moving forward with Kellen Moore in this office. Well, look, I don't want that to be the case because of what you're paying Ezekiel Elliott. I think Kelly Moore was in a situation last night where the Tampa defense was loading

the box. They were daring you to run. Vita Vey was a complete nightmare last night, and you have McGovern who is who did a great job, by the way, but the interior of your offensive line was being tested. I still think you have to make defenses, be honest. And the Cowboys just saying, well, okay, you're gonna play it like this, Well we're gonna Doude's gonna throw it all over the park. And Dad did a really good

job of finding those mismatches in those coverages. Top Bowls did a lot to try and confuse Dak Prescott, but that may have worked on a rookie quarterback. And Dad just did a really good job of manipulating the offense and getting those extra yards in the past. Yeah, in regards to the run, I think Kellen Moore has an attention attention span issue, right, attention deficit when it comes to run. He's comfortable with the pass and he was

in his bag. He said it in the postgame show last night, Kellen Moore was in his bag that boy came to play. I thought it was one of the best called games I've seen from Kellen Moore. He did an amazing job from the time, from the from the beginning snap all the way to the end. He came out with great formations, great shifts, motions. We did a

lot of twelve personnel. We talked about that this offseason, right, a lot of twelve personnel because we have two guys that can go out there and make it happen, not only to give us opportunity to run the ball, but to pass the ball. And we just abandoned the run. You know, to your point, we abandoned the run. We talked about it on this show last week. You're not getting anything up up front, up the middle. It's a wasted play. I said that, right, it's a wasted dog

on play. So when we ran outside, guess what zeke stretch? Stretch, stretch or stretch. He put his foot in the ground. And you saw the work he put in this offseason and his explosiveness. You saw him put his foot in the ground and get three, four or five yards at a pop. Right, we saw Pollard in corporation of Pollard being able to get the ball in his hands, getting him moving. And then what happened. Kellen Moore, the add came in and he said, I'm just gonna throw the ball.

It's not that we couldn't run the ball, is that we abandoned it. Yeah, And I think one thing that the way the game is change too. The short passing game can function as a suffer the running game, and they tried to do that, and they really tried to attack the edges because like you said, hey, they didn't

want to run into a brick wall. And the thing about this Cowboys offensive line, they're still very talented, but there they were young up the middle last night on the interior, and when they have been a great running team the last few years. They had Travis Frederick at center, they had Zack Martin at right guard. Zach obviously did not play in this game because of COVID, and it was just a different a different game for them. I honestly, I thought both teams saw the same game offensively, Yeah,

they saw matchups on the outside that they loved. We'll get into Tom Brady what he saw on the outside. And you know, when Sean Murphy Bunting went down for Tampa, they looked at and yeah, and they see the box loaded said, look, we love our receivers, we love these matchups. So I'm with you, like you don't want to fifty was it fifty eight? Fifty eight pass attempts? I mean that's that tied his career high for DAK that's that is too much. But they found other ways to try

to agree. Mimic the run game with some short passing game and hey, we saw some two back sets with Tony Pollard in there too. Based on this game, Tony Pollard is going to get a lot more run than he did last year. And I believe he should and and I think he's a difference maker. And then you look around the NFL, A lot of teams have that

thunder and lightning set from their running backs. Um, but going back to what you said about the tight ends and twelve personnel, Yeah, use twelve personnel when you have tight ends that can block. You know, I think our tight ends if you just spot like that, I think Jarwin did a kind of mediocre job and blocking and because but that's what I'm saying when you compliment the

formation is what I'm saying. I think that adds a different wrinkle when you have guys that can actually block and get you that extra So look, that was the main thing for me. That was you know, when I when I look back up looked at the game again last night, I was like, man, we missed some opportunities, especially in one on one matchups, the the option route down, the flipout to to Zeke where jarwin. All we need you to do is get that block man and Zeke.

You gotta win that one on You gotta if you're one on one in space, you gotta win that matchup. That I mean, it comes down to the red zone again, Like they still missed their opportunities in the red zone as good as they've been moving the ball, but I just looked at the rushing statue real quick for Tampa. Leonard Fournette had nine carries. Tampa had fourteen carries total in the game. Cowboys actually had eighteen carries if you factored four rushes by Dak. So it was just kind

of that kind of game. And honestly, the league is headed that way too, where it's it's it's turning into a track meet when you especially when you have two great quarterbacks. And after this performance, I think Dack's in that category for people to show for people that don't think he is. He's in that top tier of quarterbacks at this point in the NFL. I think no doubt. I mean, that was a gutsy game from Dak Prescott and then he's gonna have to be gutsy moving forward.

We're going to talk about that in a little bit. But I want to go back to the missed opportunities. There were four points easy left off the port a pat and a thirty one yard field goal that were missed, and Zerline took took blame for that. After the game, he was very upfront, he said, I can't miss kicks like that. I mean, he made the big kicks, made the big kicks. He missed those two and that's four points off the board, and gosh, those four points would

have been nice later on. Yeah, I mean, yeah, everybody's gonna point to Zirline. Right. You have one job to do, and that's the kick, kick extra points and kick field goes, and yes he has to score. He has to make those. Um. Unfortunately he didn't. But that was not the only thing and only opportunities that we had. Ceedee Lamb had what two drops? Yep, Ceede Lamb had two exactly, So he

had two big drops. Um. You know, there were some other past completions that were still left on the left on the on the table out there, and I think that was in regards to Dak and his hesitation to really try to drive the ball in there. His timing was off in that first half, and we had a lot of opportunities there. So it was a collective effort in terms of opportunities. Um it, everybody's gonna point the

finger as zirline and I get it. I get it, But don't be don't be just a fan being an analyst for a second and look at it and say, there's a lot of other things that we could have done that would have kept us out of a position to where we needed those four points. So I'm gonna be a complete fan here. So it doesn't matter because the and I think the coaching coaches do that. You know, you shouldn't have to rely on a kicker to win

you the game, but that's what they're there for. And a lot of times you drive the length of the field and you get close enough and you have a kicker that you understand can get you that a thirty seven yard field goal miss. Come, you can come on, bro, excuse me, excuse me. Minus six you get. You'll get no argument from me. Let's go back to the pat

you gotta get that. I mean, these are things that are differences in the game, and let's just talk about the fine points of coaching and just being able to make end game adjustments things like that. And that's when you look around the league, you look at coaching, and you could recognize those coaches that make those adjustments in game when we can't. I feel, your brother, I feel. All I'm saying is just to address that question. It's not it wasn't just Zeroline. We needed those points and

he should have had those points. Let's put that on the cops battle. They did, everybody battle. But there were other opportunities there work. There were plenty of other opportunities that put us in a bad position. That's all I'm saying. It was not solely him. Should he do his job appster frequently, but that's not the only person who did not accomplish what they needed to take care of. I mean, I didn't expect him to miss a thirty one yard

or but I mean Russ or whatever. It seemed like that's some kind of technical issue because he was pulling the ball. He was going left until if you missed the thirty one, then you come back and you've hit the He was going to sixty after the guy just mixed the thirty one? What else would you do in that situation? Man, I don't know. I wouldn't pick put the guy out there that just missed the thirty one yard field goal to try and make a sixty yard field goal. Gonna pun it, Man, you're gonna. I'm not

gonna put that guy in that situation. I don't. I don't fault them for that, for attempting that. Yeah, I really don't either. I don't. I don't. It didn't turn up into points the other way, luckily, but it did give an opportunity for it to turn into points the other way. Yeah, that was my issue with it. Yeah, it's it's Tom Brady's only needs a couple first downs and there you go. So that's what we're talking about. We're talking about what if. But that's what your whole

thesis is based off of. About what if? No no no, no, no no, no. My thesis is on taking care of what you're responsible for doing. That's what I'm talking about. He didn't. Zerline did not take care of his job, but he had not, and there were other guys that didn't take care of their jobs. And because they didn't take care of their jobs, it gave the other team opportunities. That's what I'm talking about. I'm not talking about what if scenarios. I'm saying CD should have caught those balls,

Zeroline should have made those field goals. Daks should have been on time with some of the pass cousins. No, but I'm saying, but if had they done what they were supposed to do, those were completely Okay, That's what I'm saying. That's their job, right, You're talking about Zerline, his job is to make field goals. Dak's jobs do the ball on time. CD's jobs to catch the ball, our jobs to tackle, our job on special teams and then not give up thirty yard freaking returns. You know

what I'm saying. So like, those are jobs, that's what you're paid to do. And they and unfortunately, there was a lot more than just those two kicks that guys did not complete their complete their responsibilities. Yeah. No, I'm just looking at the missopportunities and you miss you mentioned and I think see on the first drive, I think you could call it a drop by CD, but Dak kind of left it a little short. We mentioned the Zeke pitch out where they settled there in the red

zone there. You know, you get an interception at the Tampa Bay twenty one, you kick field goal. I mean those are the kind of things you look back and you're like, damn, you know, yeah, it is more than the field goals for sure. Yeah. And you can look at blown coverage on the defensive side of the football on a couple of occasions. There are some veterans I think at the cornerback spot that you might want to take a look at. But we're gonna talk about that

coming up later on when we come back. How how did Zak Prescott look in his return to action his first game and eleven months, three hundred and thirty three days put up four hundred plus yards. What did we think about him and the offense in general? When we return here with Talking Cowboys presented by Tostitos, Honey, Big News, Gary, Are you okay? Oh? I'm not Gary anymore. I'm Jackie Flash. What see? I want the latest smartphone, but the best deals are only for new customers. So to get a

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talk in Cowboys. Whether you're watching from home or you're cheering in the stands. With SLORE lenses, you can see every exciting play, a book, an appointment at your local experts and see what can do for you. See more. Do more on Talking Cowboys. We never took the camp. It was good. It was very good. Today. Let's got a lot of sad faces around here. There's a lot to take away from this game as positive. People got to see the positive insurance situation. Yeah, a lot of

positive to see. We again, we lost. We lost the game. We didn't get we didn't get scraped up. I think fans have to look at this game and be like positive, this is gonna be a fun Come on, man, Yeah, if we stay healthy, be excited the offense we have and maybe the defense continues to get better. And like, can I just say this real quick, yep, that the weather was a factor, like the humidity. You saw a post game pre game in the everybody. I mean, you

know Cowboys tried to mimic that out here. But the defensive line they played every guy, I mean even Bradley and I got ten snaps in the game. So I thought they fought defensively for what they had to deal with with the humidity and you know, missing some key guys on offense. So can I say something everybody that feels feels really sorry and sad right now TV twelve, I can say as a teammate, he doesn't blow smoke.

Right when he's talking to the media, right Hill, Hill, gas guys up, just just because that's what the Bill Belichick, you know, new Patriot way of doing things. But when he's interpersonally, he doesn't blow smoke. What did he say to Dak when they went to go shake hands? What do you say? You guys know what you guys said? He said we'll see you guys again, Tom said. Tom said to him, yeah, Dak said yeah, yeah, but Tom guess what Tom said it too, We'll see you guys again.

That's a fact. Feel good about that. Feel good about that from bro. Hey b we're talking about come on, we're talk about We're talk about the greatest player of all time. We're talking about the greatest player of all time. Undisputed, undisputed. You have to you have to acknoledge the fact you have to think, yeah, that's undisputed. You have to acknowledge the fact that this dude respect he respected the performance that put out. He know, they gave up opportunities. That's good.

They gave up opportunities that allowed us to even have a chance to win the game. So let's let's let's let's be honest. Both teams had mistakes that they don't that they don't feel good about. Yeah, Tampa Bay ran the ball less than we did. So I mean, I'm looking at both of these teams and so it's not a glass half full kind of situation we had. They asked, absolutely, Zad, we was about to beat them, do you talk coming here and you was about to have a long face.

We had a face you don't see me with on face. You don't think TV twelve was mad about a guy when dropping the touchdown. You don't think T twelve was mad. You don't think he was mad about freaking Fournette dropping the dog on easy path that he caught into a two quarters later. You don't think he was mad about that tip all interception. There's plays that they said too that that would have put them in a better situation,

that would have opened up their lead. Oh, cowboys plus three and the turnover, Come on, we've been asking it for a pee. I know you could argue that they should have won this game comfortably, or at least by by a touchdown. We had we had two real takeaways. We had two takeaways. We had two gifts, two takeaways and two gifts right there, two of them were There was two take Kazy had had to take away. De Law had to take away both of those guys forced fumbles.

The tip ball Fournette, that's a gift. They fell filling your hand, yes, okay, the hail Mary interception, that's a gift. So we had two real takeaways. We have four turnovers. We'll take it. How we get it. No, don't get me, don't getting wrong. But we took the ball away twice and we got the ball two other times. I agree with you, Hail Mary, all right, hail Mary. But the tips they count in football, that's that's tips and overthrows. Got to get those absolutely. But guess what. You didn't

do anything to take that away from that person. The ball fell in your arm, said gift. However it goes and we'll say that stuff turnover turns, come on, that's being a fan. Turnover is turn that turnover as a turnover. But if somebody drops the ball and it falls in your arms, you didn't do anything to where do you go in the column as an interception? It does? And I say that it turnovers a turnover, and where does

it go in the wind lost column? And goes in the loss You could have put You could put little heck Man in that position in the ball. He would have caught that. I don't know. The only thing I will say is there you know guys in the past past defense is like I'm thinking about Xavier Woods, Guys that had chances to make plays like that and couldn't do it, didn't come up with it. So like Okay, different teams, but yeah, you're gonna you're gonna took middle

school student and a tip ball. Would he would have copped that. Accept your gifts, accept your game, accept your gifts and guess what and put them put them in a stat sheet, because guess what, No matter what, it was four turnovers and you feel good. Even if it was just two turnovers, I would still be sitting here saying, good freaking job defense because we have an actually, we have a character on that side of the ball. Now, those guys were flying around, they were rotating in and out.

We talked about how are they going to cycle those guys through? Their linebackers were coming in and out like they were a freaking defensive lignement. Right, So if we had a lot of positive things, what I'm saying, take the turnovers. Heck, but don't don't. Don't say that you that you earned that dog on that tip ball to interception. It goes down as an absolutely it does. But you didn't do anything to earn that. That's all I'm saying. It's just it's amazing. It amazes me how the goalpost

moves when it comes down to what's it turnover? What's not. What's a wind already said if we don't hear me, I don't not. Now you hear me, but you're not listening to me. Oh god, that's a great way. You can't hear j heck mccarn't hear Jimmy as a white man and jump reference for those that don't know what I'm talking about. You hear me, but you're not listening to me. I use that in my house and I sleep on the couch for at least a month, so I appreciate that you have a nice couch though. Yeah

I do, But that's crazy. We were gonna talk Dak Prescott in a segment segments half. I'm gonna push that back. I'm gonna do that in the final segment. We're gonna keep it at defense. And you mentioned the rotation Cowboys defense on the field Thursday against the Buccaneers. How about the snap distribution from the linebackers and Michael Parsons fifty one, Neil fifty Jalen Smith saw sixteen snaps, saw sixteen snaps. It's twenty five percent of the snaps after playing ninety

five percent or more in the past. Layton Vanderesh saw fourteen snaps twenty two. When I think about that, I didn't think it would be that like as much as Tom and the Bucks spread everybody out. I mean, that's that's their sub packages is counter Neil and Michael Parsons. But I thought I thought Vanderesh might have more than

fourteen naps. But but they look, they played their nickel and that's that's what they had to do again in this in this matchup, it might change more, but it may not because this is the way offenses play, you correct, I mean this is the way the league's going now. Yeah, so yeah, they matched personnel. I mean I would have never I would have lost all my money if I would have bet that that's that would have been a

distribution playing time. Um. But you know, to the point, these guys the personnel called for a certain called for them to have a certain personnel. And if you would have put you know, vander ash and Smith out there against some of the guys that we were facing last night in more situations, there would have been more mismatches. So I think the coaches did the right thing. It's

just we just didn't expect that. Yeah. Chris Collinsworth kept pointing out those sub packages as well, and just saying that anytime that that Jalen and Layton were on the field, that was their run heavy h defense. And so I think Tom actually noticed that as well and started getting backs out of the backfield and you know, so those things if I guess, as the game progressed, I kept saying to myself, Look, Mike is doing a really good

job in the running game. Also, So if you're taking this guy out of the game because you think he's weak against the run, he's showing you otherwise. He was shooting the gap doing a lot of great things. I think look for a rookie linebacker, if you're gonna grade him, you know it's gonna be a B minus based off of where he was in past coverage. Uh. And a lot of people were pointing out that Michael looked like

his head was spending and that's Tom Brady. That's Tom Brady and not playing a game for a year also, and that and all of that. But he but I'm I'm saying as far as just him sideline the sideline, his hustle, he's showing you that he is a dog. But at the same time, coverage wise, he's gonna have to clean that up Kean O'Neill, and look, these guys are going against brounk Kowski and some one of the guys one of the best tight ends in the game.

But you know, again, I think those matchups and where they were defensively, when you talk about Tank being man to man on Grunk in the goal line, you have to have inside protection for your defense once you get that close, and then when you may you go cover zer Dahn. Tom made him, like Tom is a coach on the field, and he made him pay. You're talking about the safety blitz. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's not even cover zero and safety dress. Tom seen that a couple

of times in his career. How many how many plays did those guys have again, so it was fifty one for Parsons, fifty for Neil, sixteen for Jaln s Manth and then fourteen for Layton Banners sixteen and fourteen. Tampa Bay had fourteen Russians. Yeah, yeah, and look, I mean Jeron Curse gets forty snaps in this game, you know, And so they're playing kind of three safeties, kind of helping with the tight ends like you mentioned O. J. Howard and Gronkowski. It was match personnel. That's what they

what they had to do. That's what dan Quinn said he was going to do this offseason. He said, Hey, we're gonna play it like a basketball team. I mean, yeah, we're gonna have positions, and yeah, we're gonna have starters. And that's why it was surprised. Israel mccuama wasn't act. How did you guy, How did you guys feel? I mean, obviously there was so much drama in this game, but how did you feel overall about dan Quinn's The defense last way better than last year. Yeah, it was competitive.

My opinion, it was competitive competitive. I thought they flew around. I thought, you have your guy at the cornerback spot. Yes, Trayvon Diggs is a dude. Ye. I mean the way that he locked down Mike Evans was pretty fantastic. I mean, I gotta find the actual We're not even talking about their best receiver. No, no, I mean because he wasn't

a factor. Well, well, no, you other three. You understand aceptions for twenty four years we played, man, you understand that Tom is gonna play pennatail on the donkey, right, He's gonna find the weakest Lincoln that's what he did. All they told all games, let's find I'm gonna take what you give me at this point because I realized, you know, Aidan's dad is over there locking down. Takes the A and M guy. But you know, look, ab and I'm talking about Antonio Brown. One hundred and sixteen

yards after the first half. That's unacceptable. That's unacceptable. It is unacceptable as a defensive coordinator. However, as a defensive coordinator, you told these guys, and you've shown them, we're going to play man. I don't care what are who our opponents are, I don't care what their personnel is. I'm gonna depend on you to play man to man and I'm gonna challenge you as a man to get in their grill and stick in their hip pocket. I don't care who it is. And that's what they did. So

guess what. You took your best defensive back and you put them on their best receiver, and guess what he did a heck of a job. But then guess what, Unfortunately, this team number two receiver is really a number one receiver and our number two dB is not a number one dB. Right, So Antonio Brown versus Antonio I mean, sorry, Anthony Brown, ju I mean god Win versus Jay Lou. I mean we talked about this. Their receivers are better

than our dbs. Facts, And when you play, when you have that matchup and you decide to play man to man, you're going to give up plays and you say, I'm gonna take out your number one, your number one dB stepped up and did that. Cou doze to you. Great job, dig second year you took out Mike freaking Evans. That's

a heck of an accomplishment. But unfortunately there we don't have another trade on digs on the other side, which is why we talked about how we should have made an investment into a big boy receiver that can go out I'm a big boy dB that can go out there and lock up the other side, didn't. We chose not to. Those don't grow on trees though, and they don't grow on trees, and and it takes in the possibility, right, We looked at the possibility and there really wasn't a

huge possibility outside of the draft. But but but to my point, we were talking about off the air, name a defense that has a number two cornerback that can shut down Ab. Oh, wait, all Chris and god one's like a one A receiver. Say this guy's got three dogs out there. These aren't These aren't like okay receivers like these are number one receivers on any other team. Yeah, And if they're that and if they're that good, it's

as good as you're saying that they are. Obviously, this is going to be a repeat year for Tampa and these guys are gonna get gold jackets at there. Because if you do one sixteen after the first half and you're getting paid a salary to be a DBS coverage, there's something coverage or not. I'm saying. If I pay you to do a job and you're getting one sixteen, you're getting baked at halftime. What's the adjust What do you what do you do with that? Because because out

of the tunnel? Absolutely correct, But guess what you get your you can't. What's what's the definition of of crazy? Right? He's doing the same insanity, doing the same thing over and over again. So if you guess what if you keep stepping up to Ab thinking that you're gonna get your hands on him at the line of scrimmage, try again. If you think that you're gonna come up to ab and just shade the inside because you think that you got the sideline as your help on this particular guy,

man to man, try again. So if you're gonna get torched every single time, so guess what? You might want to play a little bit off. Maybe you might want to play cover one. You co coach called cover one. Maybe I'm five yards off and I change up my linement a little bit. Maybe I change it. Maybe I'll maybe I'll flash my hands and act like I'm gonna jam them up up and just say hold him up for a hot second. You have to try different things. Guess what he may not his bag like Kellen Moore

winning his bag. Guess what, Hey, Brown may not have his bag. Isn't that deep? His bag's not that deep. Antonio Brown has been around for a minute. He's he's he's baptized many guys. He's embarrassed many guys. And I I mean, I know you called for this last week, but you know, look, Calvin Joseph's on IR for two more weeks minimum. The other option is Greece Kennedy, who's

mostly been a slot receiver or slot corner. I'm sorry, slot corner throughout training camp, in preseason and Nashan right, so I gives up one sixteen say it's a rookie yard. Let's say if you come out, say we meet these guys in the playoffs. We meet them in the playoffs. You can't play man to man. You can't do the same thing and expect a better result just because it's later on in a season. Your personnel can't stop their

personnel man to man. It's not going to happen. That's the reality, is why they regardless of what you're getting paid. He this was like, this is like looking in the mirror honestly. I mean yes, I mean it's really the same things that everybody says about the Cowboys every week, like how are we going to game plan for these receivers? It's why Tampa. I mean, Tampa's got the same same matchup nightmares. That's what made this game so fun. I mean, it's really the same, the same offenses in a lot

of a lot of regards. The difference for Tampa is they've got more of a veteran defense with guys who can really get after you, and the Cowboys are still developing that with dan Quinn absolutely Even with Anthony Brown's five receptions for one twenty one and Chris Godwin's nine receptions for one oh five, they still were not the best receiver on the field. The best receiver on the fish shut down. No, are you talking about Coop? Was talking about him? Yeah, Coop. I'm talking about what Coop

did last night and the way that he played. Ceedee Lamb had a couple drops, but he had a really nice night as well. How did the passing game? Look, I'll tease it again. We're gonna talk about it. Don't you derail my seconds next time. Gentlemen, when we come back, you're on talking cowboys. Hey, these boys can get paid whatever they want to. You can't match up against these casts.

And that's why they won last year. Yeah, that's why their defense play well and their offense did what they did, and you got tight ends and they got a good old three title. Are we in the break? I hope so, if not, we're still talking. You know, that's why they won. That's why they won. They had They had a defense that stepped up and played right. Their defense and their offense did what they did. They create mismatches all over

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for everyone. Restrictions apply. Is it att dot com for details to Talking Cowboys Final Sentiment, a really fun edition of Talking Cowboys presented by Tostitos We've got Rob Phillips, Isaiah stand back the great, heck My Harrison, I'm Kyle Yeoman's and Heckmus just chomping at the bit ya as usual. I love y'all's arguments and carried into the break. You guys are always like both right, and you're trying to say in the same calm, but what I'm hearing it?

Would you hear that? Did you hear it was a drop? It was calmed down fighting though, he just Heckmus drop. Appreciate a right man. Chris is running on two hours of sleep. So by the way, Hugh shout out to Chris Beam got home last night at four am, and he was back up here by the man up here by six. He is a legend. So we want to give the props to Chris Beam and everybody who showed up to work this morning and are joining us early

in the morning on talking cowboys. Let's talk Dak Prescott forty two of fifty eight ties, a career high in passing attempts, four hundred and three yards, three touchdowns, the one interception that ironically might have been the best throw of the night that he had. I mean, he put it on the money into triple coverage right in the middle of the hands for Ceedee Lamb went off his hands and then was intercepted subsequently. But a good night statistically for Dak Prescott. Rob What did you see from

him in his first game in over eleven months. I can't express really how impressed I was with it, because it's not just the numbers. And yeah, I mean, I know y'all mentioned that maybe there's some some plays early in the game where he was still kind of feeling a rhythm or trying to get into a rhythm. But you just think about how long he missed and how much time he missed in training camp, and he goes out there against that quality of a defense and is

just kind of unfazed. You know, the touchdown, I think it was the first touchdown pass to Amari bad snap by Tyler Biads, No big deal, you know, pick it up and let's go. And even you know, he wasn't wary of running. You know, they used him a little bit in the red zone with some with some zone reads stuff like that done in the past. That's a top five Dak Prescott performance that I've seen in his career. And I need to go back and watch the game. It might be higher just because of because of the

team that he was facing. Where he's been m really really impressed Isaiah. Yeah, I think, I mean overall in in his entirety, I believe that Dak had had a good game. I really do think that he had a good game. He came in, he battled, he was made uncomfortable, and being uncomfortable, he still found a way to make plays. We all know that he didn't want to run the ball. We knew that Dac didn't want anything to do with it having to get off the pocket and run. But

guess what, he did it because it was necessary. We knew that Dak didn't want guys jumping around his ankle right and coming in on his knees. But guess what, he still sitting in the pocket and delivered the ball now in the first half. I will be the first one to say that he was not Dak in the first half, I think, and I think he was in his own head in terms of what he was able to do his the velocity on the ball. I don't care all you get, all the fans and everybody was

can curse me out all they wants. The velocity was not there. Balls were dying out. And again this is a very analytical quarterback perspective that I have. Yeah, but you played the position. Balls were dying out, right comebacks, the balls where we're not on the right location, fade routes, the balls were in the wrong you know, wrong shoulder. There's a lot of things like that that most people don't see that I saw in the second half. He

was thinking more about the game situation. The game situation changed, right, it was a lot more intense. So guess where his focus was. It was on moving these change it was on these other things. Not to say that he wasn't thinking about those things in the first half, don't take that literal. But he was more focused on the game situation. So the last thing he was thinking about was what his shoulder. Last thing he was thinking about was his ankle.

I don't think he was really ever, ever, really bottomized, but I think but I think in the first half, the shoulder was in his head, and I think his his velocity, his accuracy, some of those things in that first half. I think he wished he had some of those passes back. But we saw that velocity change, and you can go back and watch the timeline of the game as the game progressed as you go into the second half. That but that thing has some sting on it, right.

He was driving the ball into holes. He was making passes that you were like, oh, first half, he was that ball when't even had a chance. So it changed and he became better as the game progressed. So kudos to Dak overall. Heck of a game, heck of a battle time that he had off all that stuff to opponent. Absolutely great job, Dack. I don't want to cut you out on behalf of the fans. Yeah, you know, I just felt like, you know, Dak came out and Tom Brady too. I think both of them showed rust in

that first quarter. But I thought Dak he was a whole dog in the first half. He found open receivers. You're talking about location and you're also talking about mechanics, and I think those naturally are things that quarterbacks in their first quarter are going to struggle with it. Maybe three hundred and thirty four days away from playing football, that's the byproduct of it. I can go with that.

But I think as far as just his the mental aspect of his game, I saw no slippage in that the rust that we were expecting to see, I didn't see a whole lot of because he capped off the drive with a touchdown and you saw him do all the things that you were wondering could he do after he got hurt against the Giants, I think he answered those questions for you right off the bat. Second half again, he made all the quality reads. Look, Ti Bows threw a lot at Dak. He wanted to test him out early.

And I know, I'm like everybody else out there that when Dak was pressured in the pocket, you're like, oh, you know, get your legs out, guys holding on to him. I just feel like mentally he showed that he man,

that's one tough son of a gun. And for him to go out and play the way that he did with that gruesome ankle injury, not really in his head and play and you say he didn't want to run, He ran four times just so he did it when he needed to and it wasn't like he took it out of his repertoire like you would have seen like Alex Smith and for the Washington football team out that he had his industry injury, which was both gruesome, but again, he didn't want no smoke. He didn't want to get

out there and get out in the open field. But Dak just showed you that he's deal has it. And I loved his game. I love the way that he battled back. I loved everything about what I thought. Mentally, it was one of the best performances I've seen from a quarterback because you think about everything that he went through this offseason, you think about the ankle, and then turn around the first padded practice he comes out he's

got a shoulder injury. I'm with Isaiah and I had a great conversation last night on Twitter, And by conversation I mean I was pretty berated by a couple of fans who had great points, and I completely agree. But I saw the same thing. In the first half. The ball was dying out, the velocity wasn't there. In the second half, he was able to just rely on coming back. He had to just play football again and it was

an opportunity to do that. And I thought Kellen Moore called a hell of a game to be able to keep it underneath that Tampa Bay defense. Whether that was because the defensive line in the front seven was getting pressure or whether that was just the fact that he couldn't press the ball down the field. But I'll I'll tell you these stats. I look this up because of

the conversation. Dak Prescott last night through six balls beyond twenty yards, which is a significant drop off of a percentage of his throws that were beyond twenty yards out in those excuse me, and it was seven throws. In those seven throws, he went two for seven with that touchdown on the right side to Amari Cooper, and he had the interception which was actually a really good throw

over the middle that was dropped by Cede Lamb. Just sixteen of his fifty eight pass attempts last night went more than ten yards down the field, and in those sixteen balls, he was fifty percent, which is a thing where ten to nineteen yards as he's had in the past, according to Next Gen Stats, he's usually right up around sixty seven percent. He was at fifty percent last night and included not as many pass attempts there as you would normally see. I don't know if that's the case

because of the line. You were just trying to get the football out quickly. However, I just think there might be a bit of a timidness from Dak Prescott and this offense to really stretch the field, because we didn't see it at all last night. Some of it's the pressure too, I mean, and some of it was by design,

Like I mentioned some of that stuff. I mean, they were kind of using the short passing game to kind of function as a surrogate running game where you're not running into the defensive front and you're and you're stretching him out. I think that was sort of what they were doing game plan wise, And I liked what Drew Brees said at halftime. He said, you know there, the Cowboys have a good game plan. They're keeping him off balance. Just be patient, And that was the one thing for me.

The interception good throw, I mean in terms of the velocity on it, but it was a it was an aggressive throw and it felt like he was pressing there where he didn't have to. But if you noticed late in the game, it seemed like the and I need to watch it again, it looked like the Bucks kind

of blitzed less and just went with front four. Some of that's Viavea just pushing the pocket, but some of that too, is is Todd Bowle saying, you know, he's he's dealing tonight and we're trying to get home with the blitz and it's not working because he's busting it. I thought he was tremendous overall taking with the fence gives you, and I think he played smart and he

was very resourceful in that way. And I think in your first game back, you have to be, especially knowing the kind of the caliber of the defense that you're up against. The one throw to CD lamb if that was considered a gamble, I'll go with that. But it hits CD in the hands, and that's the catch you gotta come down with, even when you're in double coverage. And I think CD even alluded to that after the game, they like, he gotta catch that. You gotta come down

with balls that hit you in the hands. And I think that, you know, I don't think that they came out with a conservative game plan. They just came out with a game plan of look, man, everything that they give us, we're going to try and explore. And I feel I felt like Dak did a really good job of doing that and not pressing when he didn't have to, and there were plenty of times in this game where he could have made that mental error by trying to press.

He didn't, and that's a veteran move. He also did other things by changing up his cadence and making those guys jump outsides, recognizing coverage, looking off safeties, doing the great things, and finding the man the man situation on his offense. So you gotta give the gold star and smelly stick at a number four for that as well. He deserves all of that, he really does. It was

a fantastic performance. And last night I think it was more of the characteristic limit on Twitter that kind of got me in trouble because if I could have put the word early in my initial tweet, it would have stayed with you from last night. Oh I did. Yeah, No, I didn't sleep a whole lot last night because I was thinking about it. You know, I slept fine. It was the first half that that kind of concerned me a little bit. It was the second half that made

me feel a lot better about it. We're gonna see going into this week how he looks against the Los Angeles Chargers, because there's not gonna be nearly as much as much pressure from an entire front seven. I mean Boss is gonna get after him. I mean there's gonna be some some guys getting after him as well. But I want to see what the play calling looks like.

Will they stretch the field, will he be able to throw a downfield with the shoulder injury, or like Isaiah said previously, is this going to be something that lingers? And that's not something I want to think about in terms of Dak Prescott because he put up the stat but the eye test was a little shaky in the first half. Second half was much better. Moving on, But that's gonna do it for us here on Talking Cowboys presented by Tostidos. So glad you've been with us here

over the last forty five minutes. We're gonna be back on Monday. We're gonna continue breaking it down. We may even take some calls on Monday. I think we will take some calls. How about that. Let's hear from Cowboys Nation when we come back nine am Central Time Monday morning for heck Ma Harrison, Isaiah Stanback, Rob Phillips, and our MVP Chris Beam in the back running on two hours of sleep. I'm Kyle Yeoman's We'll see you next

time on Talking Cowboys. This has been a production of Dallas Cowboys dot Com and the Dallas Cowboys Football Club.