DQ Report, Week 3 - Running Right At Them
Dallas should prepare for teams to challenge their smallish defenders
Word travels fast in the NFL.
It is a small league where secrets get passed quickly. Every organization employs men who have worked for others so when there is information to be exchanged, the spiderweb of connections quickly gets activated. Everybody finds out everything.
No sooner did the news of the day start filtering that the Cowboys might have a historically-dominant defense that 31 opponents went to work to find a weakness. This is the way the league works. Something new is born and without fail, the testing begins. How can they be beaten? What are the weaknesses and how may we attack them there? What did lowly Arizona do that we can do even better?
The facts are tough. Really tough for this defense. Dak Prescott is used to feeling heat after every loss – much of it extreme and over the top – but he knows that criticism for a Dallas QB in this era is always going to be absurd until someone wins big. But, the defense? The Dan Quinn defense seldom gets their pants pulled down for all of America to see.
But, let the record show that September 24, 2023 might be the worst game Dan Quinn’s defense has looked in his time in Dallas.
Above, the Game Finder shows us the only three games that this defense has given up 28 points and 400 yards, while not having a takeaway in a game. To nobody’s surprise, they lost all three games. What might surprise you is to know they were at least 7.5 point favorites in all three games and double-digit favorites against Denver and Arizona.
To make matters worse, the amount of big plays allowed was very uncharacteristic. Dallas usually does not give up big plays. But, on this occasion, there were six 20-plus yarders – which aside from the Eagles game last Christmas was the most since that Raiders game above in 2021. And an absurd three 40-plus yarders which is easily the most conceded by this defense since the Quinn/Parsons era began. Last year they allowed nine 40-yarders in 19 games. Three in one day, especially against an offense that didn’t seem to have game-breakers, is off the charts disappointing.