GioBlog

After 2 Games, Cowboys are winners but the plan has failed

After 2 games, the Dallas Cowboys are winning, and stand alone at the top of the NFC East, but the Big Plan and off-season changes are failing in a surprising way.

Let's remember that in 2006 the Cowboys scored plenty of points and had a potent offense, but the defense collapsed in the 2nd half of the season.

In fact, the defensive collapse in 2006 was notable. For the first half of the season, Dallas had one of the top ranked defenses. But during the 2nd half of the season, the defense collapsed. The collapse occurred concurrent with the injury to defensive end Greg Ellis, but it's hard to believe that the loss of a single player, especially a non-dominant player like Ellis, could have been responsible.

What is much more likely is that a coach on his retirement tour simply didn't have the energy and creativity to make the kind of continual adjustments and changes during the season that are necessary. Once opponents had a few games worth of film on the Cowboys defense, they pretty much knew what they were going to do, and could game plan accordingly.

So the Big Plan in the offseason was to fix the defense. A tired, empty coach was driven off and replaced by a guy with a reputation as a defensive genius (Wade Phillips). The assumption was that if the defense could be fixed, the Cowboys would have something.

Coincidentally, Jason Garrett became offensive coordinator. Actually, Garrett wasn't even hired as offensive coordinator; in fact, he was hired for an undefined position, and eventually ended up as offensive coordinator after Phillips was hired as coach.

Now that the recent history bit is out of the way, here is what is interesting about the Cowboys so far this year: Even though the Big Plan was to fix the defense, it appears that the defense is actually much worse this year than it was last year.

In fact, it doesn't appear that the Phillips hire has had any beneficial impact at all on the Cowboys. What has made a difference, however, is the new offensive coordinator.

The Cowboys thus far are statistically worse than last year on defense, but stastically superior to last year on offense.

The defense is so bad, in fact, that the only reason the Cowboys have won their first two games has been mistakes made by the opposing teams.

What this means for the rest of the Cowboys season is ominous. They'll probably defeat the Bears, since the Bears have no other offense than their punt returner.

The Cowboys' offense is too much even for the vaunted Bears' defense, and the Bears' quarterback is worse than Trent Green, who couldn't damage even the questionable Dallas defense. So the Bears can't compete with Dallas on either side of the ball. The only advantage Chicago has is their kick returner, but Dallas has the best punter in the league, which should for the most part negate Devon Hester's phenomenal skills.

But a team with a good quarterback will pick the Dallas secondary apart. And that means 6 teams the Cowboys will face.

Tom Brady will pick the Cowboys secondary apart on October 14th. McNabb will pick them apart on November 4th, and maybe on December 16th. Farve will pick them apart on November 29th.  Kidna will pick them apart on December 9th. And Delhomme will finish the job on December 22nd.

That gives the Cowboys a 10-6 record. True, something odd will probably happen and they'll win one of the aforementioned games, but something odd will probably happen in one of the other games that will cause a loss.

So look for 10-6, which will probably give them a good enough record to win the NFC east, but they'll lose to Green Bay in the playoffs, and Green Bay will lose to New England in the Super Bowl, unless the football gods intervene on behalf of Brett Farve, which I hope they will.