The 2014 Dallas Cowboys have given us everything that we have seen from this team over the past 3 seasons. They have had turnover issues. They have struggled with play calling. We have also seen this defense get shredded by Austin Davis and the Rams receiving corps! They one thing that I see in this team this season is the fight and the desire, that I haven’t seen the last 3 seasons.
It could be the fan in me that wants to believe that this Cowboys team has a different feel to it, but I do. I mentioned all the things that haven’t changed about this team, now let’s go over the things that have.
The first thing is that this team has gotten younger! The Cowboys have players that are making contributions to this team that are either rookies or in their second season. JJ Wilcox has been a very good at safety and he is in his second season. Travis Fredrick has been amazing at center and he’s in his second season. Anthony Hitchens had his highs and lows in the Rams game but he showed the ability to flow to the ball and play with range. He should get better with experience. We still haven’t see the rookie Demarcus Lawrence and rookie Zack Martin has made this offensive line a strength again. This was clearly a rebuild year for the 2014 Dallas Cowboys but they are competitive with a young group of guys. That is a great sign of things to come.
While they have struggled at times with calling plays, they seem to have made a commitment to running the football. Over the years every Cowboys fan has been begging this team to run the ball. Through the first three games of the season the running game has been on point. Demarco Murray is even leading the league in rushing yards, go figure! This offensive line is opening up holes and Murray is making big plays behind it. Murray just has to take care of the ball a lot better than what he is doing.
Another thing that feels different, is the game is being taken out of Romo’s hands. Don’t get me wrong he is the quarterback and he will always control the game. The pressure doesn’t seem to be all on him. I think a lot of that has to do with Dez Bryant maturing somewhat. Over the past three season we have watched Tony Romo put this team on his back. We have watched him shake off defenders to find the one guy in the corner of the end zone. We have seen him scramble to pick up yards after a bad snap. The offensive scheme seems to give everybody a chance to make a play. Romo isn’t forcing passes to Witten anymore, he is finding Dez, Williams, and Beasley. He seems to have trust in Terrace Williams and Cole Beasley. The run game is really helping him to slow the game down and make the right decisions. The San Francisco game was a complete disaster on Romo’s part and that was all him. The coaching staff had nothing to do with him making all those bad reads. Romo seems to be a lot more comfortable in the last two games and it is showing on the field.
While the defense doesn’t look much improve the scheme does. Marinelli is using pressure to help out his secondary and he is being rewarded with turnovers. This is the approach the Cowboys will need to take all season long. If you can’t cover on the back end, you better get to the quarterback. This philosophy only works against average quarterbacks. Good quarterbacks will be able to counter the pressure with quick passes and changing the blocking schemes. The Cowboys are in luck, they don’t have too many good quarterbacks on their schedule. I really like what Marinelli is doing! Once he gets guys in that secondary that can cover and a front four that can generate pressure, this defense will be very dangerous.
The biggest difference that I’ve seen so far is probably the most important one. The team seems a lot more discipline. I haven’t seen all the procedure penalties that I was once seeing. I remember this team shooting themselves in the foot too many times. An offensive linemen would false start. The center would get a snapping violation. Doug free would get a holding penalty. All these things stall drives and lead to losses. I’m not seeing a whole lot of that in the first 3 games. The turnovers are one thing, but procedure penalties are another. They can correct the turnover issue and I believe they will. If the penalties can stay down then this team will have a good shot at winning this season.
Three games is a small sample size believe me. The saying is what you do in practice is what you will do in the game. If what I’ve seen in the first three games is any indications of how this team will play all season, this team might surprise some people. The ability to run the ball alone makes this team dangerous because we know what they can do through the air. The defense has been solid, not good and not completely bad. Keep in mind that this is a rebuild year for the Cowboys. If they are able to develop young guys, get production from those guys and win games at this same time, we could be witnessing a start to something great.
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