DawgTalkers.net Forums The Archives 2020 NFL Season Looking Back: Browns 49 Cowboys 38 A Little Help, Please . . ..

I am glad for the win, but I need help understanding what our secondary is running and why it is so bad. Or is it the defense as a whole? Looks like prevent and the rush didn't get there though pressure was applied. But play after play in drive after drive just came up giving away too many yards per play again and again. To me, some of those plays looked similar in different drives. We had huge cushions on corners, left the middle wide open, and Dak had a field day for yardage.

What fixes this? Are we playing lousy zone? Or is this some incredibly subtle NFL defense that worked just like it is supposed to on this Sunday? Trying to see things better, but this is beyond me. Can't al just be Sendejo, though Dak threw at him many times. Just not able to sort this out on my own. I appreciate any help with this.

For most of the 2nd half I was thinking Prescott was going to throw an Int any time now. He did too, several times, but our LBs and DBs couldn't catch them. I'm sure its not the whole answer to your question, but if I was our DC, I would have our DBs and LBs spending some time with the Jugs machine next week.

Dallas does this to everybody

Same old McCarthy, a ton of pass yards and a Loss...

behind the D line we are pretty weak. Some of that is due to injury. Delpit going down forced Sendejo on to the field way more than we imagined prior to Delpit being injured.

Ward has been in and out. Greedy, I don't even know what to think about that guy.

Other than maybe a mid round O-line pick, and Kyle Pitts if he is somehow available with our 1st rounder, we need to think D...backers and DB's.

We have to tighten up that side of the ball.

Which is it, our secondary wasn't very good, or Dallas has one helluva Offense?

Prescott was slingin' it. Give credit where credit is due...

But yes, our secondary also sucks.

What I was curious about was where our defensive front went midway through the 3rd quarter? They were beastly and then just kinda dissolved. Did this coincide with when guys started going down (Richardson and Ogunjobi)?

While I didn’t think they’d cut it to 3 (and there’s no way in heck I ever thought we’d be up 41-14) ... you just knew Dallas would start humming. I mean, their offense is really good. Perhaps top 3 in the NFL. And once they got momentum, it’s TOUGH to stop

Their offense also matches up VERY well against our D. They have a ton of very good pass-catchers, and a QB that can look elite, while also having a runner back there that you have to respect.

There have been 5 TD's scored on this defense in prevent type looks. I think this is partially intentional when we are up by two scores and have a lead. It seems like something we are doing on purpose and is something that needs to be fixed if we want to be a real contender.

Two TD's against the Bengals in garbage time.

Three TD's against the Cowboys in garbage time.

If you really think about it the Cowboys had to play perfect in that 4th quarter to get it back to 3 points. They did.

OBJ bailed us out and Ward made a nice play late.

Our "up 2 or more scores" defensive philosophy needs to change.

The best way to seal a win is to bleed the clock with your own offense. Bleeding it with their offense, especially continually, is a recipe for disaster that will bite you eventually.

Allowing the Cowboys to close the gap as much as they did was nothing less than a complete defensive failure. Sadly, I think it is also pretty representative of what this defense is without our fully stacked DLine. When it came right down to it, we just could not get in Dak's face.

While I agree with what you are saying, when you are in prevent, you drop everyone back to keep your opponents play in front of you. That prevents you from having enough bodies up front to employ the blitz.

They on the other hand can keep more bodies in to block.

It certainly isn't the entire reason for the total collapse of our defense in the fourth quarter but it does play a big part in it.

I think a part of it was that we knew we could force Dallas to take at least 3/4 min to score a TD. We were up 4 scores and there were 15 minutes left. Chances are Dallas makes a mistake that puts the game away. They EVENTUALLY did just that after dropping 4 INT's from Dak...

I'd rather win 41-14 than 49-38

Keep pressuring, keep your foot on the gas, it's been working, worst case you give up a score or 2. Going soft or prevent you're almost guaranteed to give up a score or 2 and make it easier for them to recover.

As I mentioned before, I'm less worried about the performance of the D in the Dallas comeback than I am the offense. We knew Dallas's offense is very good going into the game... and we knew going in that our D was bad (especially vs the pass). I was surprised that their D tightened up like it did against our O. I was hoping we'd be able to continue to pound it against their D, and if they did successfully sell out to defend the run, we could make them pay. That didn't happen at the end of the game.

I fully understand the concept of the Prevent. You deliberately trade yardage for time while trying to make them take 10+ plays to march it down the field, and you gamble the premise that the more plays it takes, the more opportunity there is for them to make a mistake.

It's a sound theory, but it works a whole lot better when a.) you don't Butch Davis it by starting to play it in the first half and b.) your defense is decent enough to not be giving up a first down on every play. It's also generally inadvisable against high-powered and talented offenses. Going Prevent against Peyton Manning was just begging him to beat you - and he often would.

If your opponent has a powerful offense, it is a whole lot better to get them off the field as quickly as you can and then have your offense bleed the clock against their defense.

We took our foot off the gas, went into a shell, and got super conservative.... and it nearly cost us the 'W' in a game where we were up 41-14 enter the 4th quarter. Their O is too good, and our D too soft, for us to have been in Prevent (or soft zone, whatever...).

That is what I am feeling. We swap time for plays, but we really gave much more away than faster with that lead than I expected. Very little challenge from our secondary. They executed and Dak certainly spins it. But, yeah, the way we play it, no lead is safe with this secondary and we have seen it before. We don't seem to adjust much after failing to take much away.

Thanks for the insights, Dawgs!

I believe the answer you are looking for is Sendejo (or as some have staarted calling him...Pendejo :))

1st quarter: Sendejo pulls off his man for the most ridiculously wide open TD (everyone seems to assume he was expecting help over the top but that is comically inconsistent with how late he pulled off his man and the fact that he faded off and was in between two different routes)

2nd TD: Cowboys get a comically easy TD when Sendejo decides to lower his shoulder for a hit instead of, ya know, using his hands to knock the ball away (alas the hit he delivered was to Ward and the receiver walked in)

That was it for Dallas until the 4th...

The second TD drive in the 4th was highlighted by two deep passes to TE's right down the middle (1 guess as to who was in coverage).

But wait, Ron Popeil, there's more...the TD in the corner to Lamb to cut the lead to 3, you ask? Oh yes...good ol' number 23.

Ironically his PFF grade went up since he managed to cause a fumble, I believe.


In the immortal words of James Franco, he has "GOT TO GO!"

I was simply discussing why we weren't getting pressure as was eluded to. The numbers dictate you're not going to get much if any pressure while playing prevent.

Alluded.

Command of grammar can be elusive.

Identifying a prevent defense can be elusive as I alluded to in another thread.

Btw...………..did anyone else notice how Chubb "eluded" that cornerback who had him dead to rights on his long run?

It happened so fast, I thought it was an allusion!

LOL

Seriously speaking about that...…...I remember as kid, I had the hardest time with effect vs affect. I would write long sentences just to avoid having to choose either word. LOL

And when I was in grammar school [elementary for you young pups[ I had a hard time w/then vs than. Not sure why, but I did.

I've always pretty good with the grammar intricacies. I can relate to the long sentence thing though, I can see myself doing something like that lol. Part of that is the result of being a perfectionist.

I'm over fifty and I've always been really good with spelling, but, I still have those nagging words that I can still never seem to spell right... and the "i" before "e" thing drives me insane.

I was a victim of On Walden's Pond. One sentence could run a page and a half. I used to have contests w/myself on how long of a grammatically correct sentence I could write while alternately pleasing and perplexing my teachers who were rather set in their ways when it came sentence structure and the importance of alternating long and short sentences that aided one's "voice" while trying influence one's readers on a certain subject, whether it be a persuasive, narrative, informational, argumentative, or interrogative piece in our Junior High School classrooms, that contained a wide range of young writers, varying from completely incompetent to gifted in the art of word crafting.

My brain hurts.

I read your post and remembered the sentence diagrams we had to do in order to learn grammar. Remember those? You'd identify the subject and then make all the little branches for adjectives and prepositions and whatnot. At the end of that lesson group, we got sentences like the one you just wrote, and I remember I was basically like, "Nope" when my teacher asked me try it.

Gawd. I hated the tree diagrams. Boring as hell. I used to do so poorly on those quizzes because I thought they were worthless. I remember my fourth grade teacher scolding me.

The cool thing is that I have a BA and a Masters in English. I have also published short stories and a book of poems. I even sold the UVA the rights to use my work for their English Department description. I doubt they are still using it, but I can provide my mock up and show how they bought the rights to it. But gawd, that was boring.

What works for poetry, often doesn't for prose.

That's funny. I struggle with long sentences. Now that I'm semi-retired, I've started reading a lot. I've gone from a page turning psychological thriller to a book written by a family member...

Constitutional Law

Reading the papers and articles of law written by the early settlers in this country? You would swear they were taught that a period is nothing more than a waste of ink!

Thank you Mr. Grammar Police. I knew you were searching for a position of authority on here and it appears you have given yourself a self appointed role.

self-appointed

He even has a back up official. Line judge?

Isn't it "backup?"

I don't really care. But since you do, why did you leave the classroom again?

It is.

For all intensive purposes, he should of left this alone. But I could care less as it's a mute point.

That was literally the funniest thing I've read all day. I could of died crying! regardless, I need to step away from this chicanery and dethaw some chicken for dinner tonight, if I don't my wife will loose her mind!