Cowboys - 49ers Preview

When I looked at the schedule for the beginning of the season, out of the first four games I thought this was one of those “trap” games as it would of been after the Monday night game against a division foe, but after the debacle Monday night in the last six minutes, I think the Cowboys will be all fired up and will try to put this game out of reach early. I look for the offensive playbook to open up this week and the defense will put pressure on Rattay all day. I’ll be looking for some corner blitzes this week and Ware to have a big game.

Dallas 31 SanFran 9

Heeeeyyyyy!

Derick! Becker! Chadus! Did ya’ll just read Rafael’s Preview?!

He says the Niners will pick on Aaron Glenn in the nickel cuz of what happened Monday night!!??? – doesn’t he mean Roy Williams? Doesn’t he know it was ALL ROY’s FAULT??

Of course, neither he, nor the rest of us morons, have the understanding and grasp of the game that ya’ll possess. Ya’ll need to set him straight!

Don’t be shy now- Go get ’im!!!

… enlighten us all.

Ware gets his first sack and the boys D holds them to minimal yardage. J.J. gets his first 100+ yard game and 2 TD’s. the boys get up early cowboys 31 49ers 6

rich: that wasn’t ALL ROY’S FAULT it was a combination they both screwed up. when the same 2 people get beat twice in a row its not just the one mans fault it is on both of their shoulders

MARK,

I GET you brother; I’m referring to our three resident “experts” who blamed it all on Roy. They slammed him after the game- mercilessly- but now they seem to be backing off, saying how great they think he is. I think they were just “emotional” after the lose- no fortitude. But forget those guys.

Nonetheless, I STILL BLAME OUR OFFENSE for Monday night’s meltdown. If we’d have played aggressive, like the hungry young team that we are, we’d have scored more than 13 damn points. Those 2 late TD’s wouldn’t have mattered. We shouldn’t have put our defense in that position- for the second straight week no less. They’re not that good… not yet.

If you don’t capitalize on your scoring opportunities, you leave the door open for the other team- you give them too much control. We’re NOT gonna win like that.

In today’s league, when any team can put together a lucky string of scoring drives, you have to play like you are behind. You have to play with urgency. You have to be smart, but aggressive. You have to play like you WANT it.

Our offense didn’t play like that on Monday night. But everybody wants to nail Roy, and after the way he’s played for us, IT ISN’T FAIR the way they’re treating him. I hope he forgets our fans’ backstabbing him when his contract is up. He’s the ONLY one that puts fear in our opponents. His mere PRESENCE affects the game in ways we can’t even fathom- not even our three so-called experts….

But what do I know- I’m just a life-long fan who’s loyal to his team.

rich, my gringo friend:
Keep my name out of Williams bashers, I’m not bashing him, if you read correctly in the other thread I said that the scheme wasn’t favorable to him and he had to react too fast when he saw Moss heading towards the middle, Williams should have been deployed deeper, waiting for the long pass, but he wasn’t. As it sounds, I’m laying more fault on Zimmer and Parcells than what on Williams or Glenn.

Rich,

The hooked on phonics doesn’t seem to be working for you.
This is what Raf said,

Donâ€â"¢t be surprised if the 49ers try some plays from the Redskinsâ€â"¢ playbook and try to isolate receivers against Cowboys nickel LC Aaron Glenn. Glenn plays outside when Dallas is in nickel and he was on the opposite end of both long TD bombs to Santana Moss last week.

if, isn’t will, but other teams around the league have schemes to try to isolate a certain player against ANY team. We must have struck a raw nerve with you, as you seem to be all hot and bothered, you cant seem to let it go, I know its always everyone elses fault, Zimmers, Parcels, the Corner, the d-line didn’t get pressure, the stadium janitor, the cheerleaders, yes.everyone but our overrated one dimentional safety who can only play moving forward and doesn’t understand the concept of the cover two of not letting the reciever get behind you when you’re the over the top help for the corner on his side of the field,as what the scheme is designed to do, not allow long bomb touchdowns but you should try to move on.

Why dont YOU enlighten us rich on what you think the Cowboys should do this weekend to get a win, I’d be interested in that instead of throwing out insults all the time, cant you handle opinions of others that disagree with your opinion. thats what debate is, I respect everyone opinion here, but you have a habit of misrepresenting what others say, you said that alot of us said we should trade Roy, never read anyone say anything to the sort.

Lifes too short son, try to lighten up. Here endith the lesson.

Chandus,

I went back and re-read that thread. You’re right- You weren’t bashing Williams. Your criticism was more towards the defensive scheme, and not at all eratic and emotional as those other two guys. You sure didn’t single out Roy Williams- you’re much more sensible than that.
 
I’m sorry about that.

It’s just that you jumped in on the becker and derick “bit@h-a-thon” at the wrong time, and I just associated you with their scene. I’ll try to read more carefully next time.

Again, my bad, compadre. No hard feelings.

Rich,

funny post. I agree with you completly, but there are those who are fixated on Roy.

p.s. I just hope our 2006 WOLB Roy Williams ate his biscuits this week!!

8 responses-6 people talking about themselves (Bet they listen to Jim Rome-who was funny and great 10 years ago and now’s a self-parody) and one homer (Believe me-I hope you’re right, Mark!) But what is there to say about this game? We’re all afraid, cause it’s a no-win situation. We SHOULD kick their butts! If we do, so what? But if we don’t, this team will lose some confidence. So let’s hope we stuff their running game, score some TD’s (real reason we lost-let’s drop the RW thing) and put these guys away early! On a different note, I’m as frustrated as some of you with Anthony T and P Price, but they’re insurance policies! We’re like the Yankees-we can stockpile talent now just in case we’ll need it-what a luxury! And sooner or later, JJ or a receiver will go down, and we’ll be glad to have starter quality backups. We’re not going to go through the whole season uninjured. Put ’em on the practice squad, whatever, cause when we lose someone, BP and JJones will look like geniuses for having them around

Ah, derick….

I KNOW you never said “trade the guy”- it’s sarcasm, dude. Look it up.

And hey, this is ALL discussion- and I do enjoy this banter with other Cowboy fans who are as passionate about our team as I am. Yeah, that means you, becker, chandus, cash, erica P (where’d he go, anyway?) and all the other over-opinionated smart-asses on here- Man, I feel right at home.

Now. YOU remember Monday night- you were in total support of our crappy offensive play-calling. Yes? Remind me of where you’ve conceeded that that may have been a mistake. Have you even MENTIONED the fact that our offensive play-calling was less than inspiring? Or are you being SENSITIVE about your initial support of our conservative play. So you saw ROY in on those last key plays and went after him with a freak’n hammer and nails. I’m just say’n that ain’t fair is all. He deserves better than that.

Now, if we’d have scored more POINTS, brother, those 2 FLUKE TD’s wouldn’t have mattered at all. Period. You HAVE to expect a late run, especially against the skins… on Ring of honor night… in front of the whole country!!! You couldn’t see that coming?? It’s the freaking REDSKINS!! They live for spoiler crap like that! That’s what they do!!

Play Conservative?!! MY A$$!!

I’ve ALREADY articulated my position on the basic necessity TO SCORE POINTS!! Otherwise you leave it all up to your defense, which means you put the OTHER team in control. Not good. I’ve covered this already! Go back and read my stuff- and not just the first and last paragraphs. I don’t wanna write it again…

Oh, and my game plan for getting a win on Sunday?

Score… more… POINTS.

How’s that for expert analysis?

Great analysis. I totally agree. The ’boys need to take advantage off every scoring opportunity. With every trip into the red zone, they need to take it in to the end zone because settling for a field goal is not a sure thing. Playing conservative will not help when your kicker is spotty past 40 yards.

Derrick,

I know you have consistently maintained that the Cowboys were in cover-2 on those two touchdown passes, but do we actually know that to be a fact. I have read in other places that the Cowboys were in cover-4. In cover-4, while the safeties are responsible for the deep coverage, they are also assigned a man. Specifically, their primary responsibility is to cover the slot receiver (on their side) deep. Their secondary responsibility is to help the corner with the wide receiver.

Now, personally, I can’t tell the difference, just by watching the tape. However, it is obvious that in the first touchdown pass, Williams was covering the slot receiver deep, and only broke that coverage when the pass was in the air. If they were in cover-4, that is exactly how he should have played it.

On the second touchdown, the slot receiver ran a square-out. In the cover-4, that would have freed Williams sooner. I have reviewed that play several times, and I can’t really say that Williams paid much attention to the slot receiver.

Again, personally, after watching both plays several times, I absolve Williams of all blame on that first touchdown. That one goes to Glenn, alone. On the second pass, I believe they should share responsibility for it.

As to why the Cowboys might not have been in some kind of total-prevent defense, keeping all receivers in front of them at all cost, I believe that with 2:44 left to play, it was much too early to go into that form of defense. The Redskins had plenty of time to throw underneath (and even run the ball), and march down the field so that they could have been well inside the red zone with plenty of time left (and time outs) to call any plays they wished.

Mr. Bill:
They should’ve expected the long pass if not on the first TD, in the second they should’ve, they had the experience of 3 full quarters of things that didn’t worked for them, the long pass was the only thing that worked, and still, they didn’t respond to it. Looks a lot like they’re looking for the L, just to give some reality bites to a team which when they took the lead by 13 looked a lot like the winners of the game with a lot to be played still.

Should they have expected another long pass?

If I were the ‘skins at that point, needing only one more TD, I’d have tried to run and spread the ball underneath, thinking that Dallas would be playing back- wanting to avoid “another” bomb. Also, I would NOT have wanted to score too quickly, which would leave Dallas enough time to march down the field for the game winning field goal. (Which we DID end up having, and not capitalizing on- even after Thompson’s nice return.)

Dallas was probably playing against this strategy- playing underneath and looking for the pick or a big Roy Williams POP for a fumble recovery. I don’t believe they thought lightning could strike twice- I don’t think anybody saw that coming.

Regardless of the mistakes by Glenn and Williams the offense should have put more points up PERIOD. During the 3rd qtr every Dallas fan out there knew that 13 points was not enough to clinch, even with 5 minutes left in the 4th. I cannot sit here all season long and watch old school Parcells be so damn conservative that he thinks he can win games with only 13 points on the board. Another field goal in the second half would have done it. I agree with Rich. Parcells said this week that he should have run the ball more during the 4th quarter. Expect to see more of the same for most of the season. Parcells is so afraid of his players making mistakes that he wants to play as conservative as possible.

Guess what that does? Defenses will bring 8 in the box again, limiting JJ to under 100 yds. Mix it up will ya Parcells? I THOUGHT we had a great receiving group. Was Washington’s pass defense that good? Hell, they didn’t even blitz much. What the hell is Parcells smoking these days anyway? If we had won, I still would be really upset about last Monday’s performance. 13 points is lousy, period.

also I am pissed because I have a wedding to go to tomorrow… I live in the bay area and I have tickets to the 49er game and cannot go…

sucks!!

I think this will be a game of redemption……lets let our “investments” rip!Lets get ugly and nasty and let the wolves loose(Spears,Canty,Ware,Burnet,Ellis,Glover,Ferguson,Fujita,Williams,etc.) and build some confidence!Let Bledsoe spread the feild with Keyshwn,Glenn,Crayton,Price,Witten and blow em off the line and let JJ run wild!BP got embarrassed in the press this week so look for him and Payton to seek redemption and respectThis team is packing lots of number one draft choices and talent and after a week of being bashed they will look to knock the snot ouuta someome!Dallas 34 SF 10

rich:
Wash tried to run and spread the ball all through the game and they finished with mediocre numbers with their star back and average receivers, those long passes were the only thing that clicked for them and after that first one they should had expected a repeat, at least taking one Safety deep on Moss side would have been my choice.

But still, the future looks bright, let’s enjoy the dawn of this team.

mikeA skip the wedding……and remember it is always easier to ask for FORGIVENESS than PERMISSION……..unless it is yours or you are in it………just send a gift!

Derrick:
Do you think that Parcells is willing to let an overweight and slow Safety cover guys with 190 pounds? Yes, he is, he’s willing to have that guy covering the middle, because that way he can destroy the ball carrier with those heavy hits. I do believe that he’s fine, mention to me a couple of ball hawking Safeties in the league that are pretty good in coverage and I can mention to you the teams that are willing to go over the middle of the field because the hits aren’t that hard.

I guess we’re spoiled, we had Meredith, Staubach, White and Aikman at QB for the most part of our history and for the last few years pure spare parts. And we also had Mel Renfro, Cliff Harris, Charlie Waters, Michael Downs, Bill Bates and Darren Woodson at Safety.

BTW, I love being as spoiled as I’ve been, but that shouldn’t take our eyes out of the upmost important goal in Football, getting a team that can win on Sunday.

Chandus, Bledsoe is a better QB than White, although White could punt. Meredith threw well, but had his own issues with football sense, such as cutting upfield to get an extra two yards rather than getting out of bounds when time was running off the clock and the team trailed (against the Packers, in the 2nd championship game—I remember it costing the game well.)

Similarly, Renfro was a CB, not a safety, Waters was a step slow and frequently messed up coverages (somewhat like Roy), and Bates—forget it. He was a safety in name only. The Cowboys carried him for special teams, since he was tenacious, but he had to be one of the slowest Cowboys ever that did not play O line. I know Chuck Howley could have easily outrun him, and Bob Lilly might have, too. Downs was a blitzer who stank in coverage.

Harris and Woodson are the only two all pro caliber safeties to wear a star, and Staubach and Aikman are the only two all pro caliber QBs. These four should all be in the HOF, but the rest you mentioned (except Renfro, who was a HOF caliber CB) were complimentary players (i.e., spare parts) themselves.

bert:
I know that some of the names I mentioned weren’t the best players, what I was trying to mean is that they were all considered Football players and some of them were pretty good, but everyone, if not average, were above average. And we’re really spoiled for that.

ENOUGH OF THE WHINING!

FLOCK THE ALTERNATIVE ’69ERS!

GO COWBOYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ALTERNATIVE LIFESTYLE ’69ERS that is. LOL!

rich,
since you have don’t read my posts and have continued
to lump with your so called Roy haters i will assume the role
for a post.

Have you considered that perhaps your boy Roy is the
weak linkCould it be that teams looking at last years
film saw how pathetic roy was in pass coverageThat roy
without Woodson is a below average safety???Only time
will tell…….if teams continue to attack the center deep
i think we will have our answer…….

By the way a 13 point lead with 8 mins left is more than
enough offense………….oh yeah except for those teams with
roy williams at safety……….maybe we can get AB and his 3
for 32yds to help bolster our O…………

becker

Bring back AB and his 3 for 32yds. You have to remember that 3 for 32 was on a team that scored 26 pts in the game that they won. His full talents were on display for that game. He would not have picked up so many yards in a grind it out game like the Boys had last Mon. night. :-)

Looks like knbr.com (San Fran radio station) will have the game. Is there a station that will have the game and Dallas announcers? My area doesn’t have the game on TV. We get to see the local team.

becker- It’s official: You DON’T know what you’re talking about…

I QUOTE: “a 13 point lead with 8 minutes left is more than enough offense”?!?!

YOU REALLY BELIEVE THAT CRAP???!!!

Wow!

Yeah, maybe, WAAAAY back before free-agency- but in TODAY’S league? You have to stay aggressive- The objective of a good offense is to put points on the board.

You don’t play the clock unless you’re ready to kneel. Trying to hold on to a 13 point lead with an offense that can’t convert a 3rd down against an arch rival is just plain DUMB!

Even Parcell on Cowboys Weekly this morning refered to a few offensive plays toward the end that he said he’d do differently. Well, at least HE’s learning. Difference is, some of us saw our offensive mistakes as they were happening and could already see how we were setting ourselves up to lose. But YOU and derick still don’t get it.

Scoring more than 13 measly points would have made those last 2 skins TDs as irrelevant as, well, YOUR silly argument. lol.

Thanks for my making my retort so easy….

YA’LL NOTICE how becker still has to bring up Bryant cuz he has nothing else to say (nothing logical anyway)??!! Sounds like a bitter, bitter guy, this becker… He sees Bryant as a “bad guy” cuz he didn’t work out in Dallas. Now Roy Williams is gets his wrath because he “cost us the game” all by himself- as becker and derick see it. Ya’ll are an unforgiving lot, and that’s not good for you, guys.

I still hope Bryant gets his act together, as a player and an individual. I won’t follow his stats and root against him. That’s just twisted. I don’t hate him or anything. God knows he has the talent to be a good receiver- If he can just get his head straight.

And hey becker!! Where’s your boy, Morgan, anyway?? How’s HE doin’? lol.

What a bunch a wierdoes we have on here… Oh well, at least they give us something to LAUGH AT!

Darren Woodson’s forte was shutting down tight ends (especially, early in his career) and playing in the box against the run. He also was our defensive quarterback, getting everyone in the proper position, and an inspirational leader. But, he wasn’t all that great at covering deep either, especially towards the end of his career. Perhaps even this short time has allowed us to forget, but Woodson whiffed on his share of long balls too. I cannot count the number of times I read someone complaining about Woodson’s (lack of) coverage skills. The funny thing was, that whenever Woodson was out of the game, our defense always fell apart. I suspect the same would happen if we took Williams out.

Hey! He was a STRONG safety! So is Williams. Each has/had his own positive strengths, but neither one was especially effective at playing deep center field.

It’s just something we have to live with to accept all the good things that happen when Roy Williams is in the game. As I recall (and I watched him throughout his professional career), Jim Brown was a lousy blocker. So what!?

Although I didn’t like several of the play calls, specifically, I have no problem at all with the strategy of keeping the field goal in hand, when you are up 10-0 with only half a quarter to go in the game. 13-0 should be enough to beat an offense that had not scored a touchdown in 7-1/2 quarters of play; against an offense that looked lost against us, and could hardly cross midfield, much less get into the end zone. The problem is that it didn’t work. Well, the best strategy doesn’t always work. Drawing to an inside straight is widely considered to be poor strategy, yet, sometimes it works. That does not negate the best strategy. It just demonstrates that the laws of probability lead to less failure if you use that best strategy, but they don’t rule that failure out.

My main question is, why was Tyson Thompson in the game at that point, and why was he running three straight draw plays up the middle? Julius Jones was actually taken out on that drive, after Larry Allen was called for holding. I can understand not wanting to risk any further negative plays, which would have taken us out of field-goal range. But, those play calls seemed overly conservative, and Julius might have run them better. It seemed a poor utilization of Thompson. Heck, Anthony Thomas probably could have run those particular plays better than Thompson did. We must have more plays than that in our playbook that can be used with minimal risk of lost yardage.

Can’t wait for this GAME to start!!! Seems like it’s been forever!!! Maybe a good win will allow us to move on and get rid of this bad-blood.

I dunno about that Mr Bill,

13 points SHOULD BE enough to beat any team? Well, any COLLEGE team, yeah. But not an NFL team- not anymore- and certainly not a hated team on a nationally televised game. That’s why they’re rivals- that’s why fans of niether team will watch these franchises play- cuz improbable stuff happens- like 2 TD’s in the last 4 minutes!

I dunno- maybe you guys just aren’t as greedy as me. I want to score points, and lots of ‘em. I’ve seen us lose too many close games in the past, and in today’s NFL, you have to keep pouring it on. Play smart, of course, but play aggressive.

The 1992 NFC Championship game should have taught us that. We would have LOST that game, ie. “the catch II”, we had played conservative at the end. Instead of running the ball, which is what the everybody expected us to do, we hit HARPER on that long play with 4 minutes to go- even though we had the lead. THAT is how you win games. Not this “keep-away” mess we played pretty much the whole game Monday night.

Any team can have a great quarter- look at the niners against the Rams. If you don’t anticipate a late run by your opponent, you’d better anticipate a stunning lose.

Rich,

What’s this nonsense about “today’s game?” What’s different about free agency NFL? This isn’t the old AFL or the reincarnated WAC, where everyone is BYU. How did the Ravens win a Super Bowl in “today’s game?” How about the Bucs? If Jimmy Johnson had a 13 point lead in the fourth quarter a decade ago what do you think he’s gonna do? Run Emmitt about ten times in a row is my guess.

He did that a lot in fact. The difference is that his offense was better at executing this strategy than Dallas was last week. That doesn’t make it a bad strategy. Jimmy in fact LOST a game doing what you subscribe, trying to throw out of his own end zone to protect a lead against the Redskins. Troy Aikman was sacked, fumbled the ball and the Redskins stole a game the Cowboys dominated. Nobody talks about it because the Cowboys won the Super Bowl that year, but it was dumb.

You’ve got a point that the Woody Hayes-like game plan contributed to the loss. But you know what? If you’ve got a 13 point lead with five minutes left you should win the game at any level, high school, college or “today’s” NFL. But EVERYONE contributed to that loss, offense, defense and special teams. A new game is coming up in three hours. Let’s move on.

I second that. Well put, Rafael.

The Harper catch did put that particular game out of reach, but it was the correct call because the 49ers had grabbed the momentum, and the Cowboys needed to stave them off. It was a lot like the 4th and 2 option pass Texas ran (with James Brown) against Nebraska 10 years backor so to derail the Huskers in the conference championship game. I also recall Aikman throwing nice touch passes out of his own end zone right to Philly DBs a few times, leading to losses.

The Washington loss was stunning because nobody, least of all Washington, expected it to come as it did. There were enough mistakes to keep Washington in the game, and they capitalized. That is that. 13 points should beat those turds most games, especially if they can’t get their running game going any better than it did in that game.

Rafael,

Oh yeah, if we had EMMITT, I’d be running the ball too!! While he was there Monday night, he was only there to get his award. Julius Jones is our guy now, and he wasn’t even on the field for a few of those key plays….

And I remember the washington game you’re talking about- Troy DID NOT FUMBLE- his arm was going forward. It was an incomplete pass. Bad call. They were blitzing and we thought they we had the personel to pick it up and throw the ball in that situation. I give Johnson/Turner credit for that call!!! Took guts!! They we’re looking for the run and the skins woulda gotten the ball back in good field position if we’d had to punt.

On Monday night, ON THE CONTRARY, we WERE NOT in our end zone during that key drive- in fact, Thompson’s return gave us good field postion. BUT by then Washington had the monentum- and it wasn’t until then that DAllas started to open it up- a little. But it was too little too late-

You can’t just turn it on when you want it. We didn’t play with any urgency until the end of the game. You can’t do that in TODAY’S NFL where ANY team can get hot, and any them can go cold, at any given time. The days of the truly dominant teams are history, brother.

So yeah, maybe, 13 points was enough, until that 13 point lead became a 6 point lead. Then all it was gonna take was ANOTHER LUCKY BOMB, and all the conservative play-calling comes right back to hit you in the face when you realize that you shoulda, coulda, woulda….

Hopefully THEY have learned from their mistakes. But yeah- let’s move on. Nothing like a win to change everything.

Bert,

You don’t think washington grabbed momentum when they got within 6 points?? You couldn’t feel the game slipping away at that point? You didn’t see that coming? C’mon.

And c’mon niners. I’m ready for a new topic here….

And I don’t like being singled out with this “let’s move on” crap- as if I’M the one that wouldn’t let this stuff go. I simply stood up for ROY when some posters on here were constantly bashing him and unfairly putting the entire Monday night melt down on his shoulders. We were “melting down” from opening kickoff with our ANEMIC offense.

I wouln’t have kept coming back to this mess if all the haters on here would have let up on Williams. I’m not instigating, but I won’t just sit back while others on here bash one particular player so harshly and needlessly when they are obviously as wrong as they can be….

NOW. Let’s move on, shall we? We’ve got some niners butt to kick!

Rich,

You started again on this threat with quotes from Raf not
me!

rich,

“13 points SHOULD BE enough to beat any team?”

Well, I don’t really know, rich, but that is not even CLOSE to what I wrote. I would appreciate it, that if you are going to argue with me, you argue against something I actually wrote, not something you made up to make your argument sound more plausible.

whatever.

bill,

(is this “closer” to what you wrote?)

“13-0 should be enough to beat an offense that had not scored a touchdown in 7-1/2 quarters of play;” To which I would say, “but it wasn’t”- but you already say that in your post….?

okay, ah… i guess i can’t “argue” – cuz after re-reading your stuff, you don’t seem to have a piont at all- just a rambling observation about probabilty…?

it works, it doesn’t work, leads to failure, don’t rule out failure, blah…

I guess you’re too deep for me….