I can’t keep up! The articles, opinions and analysis about the Duel in Dallas All-American Bowl are coming too fast for me to keep up. Everybody’s talking about it. Tomorrow I’ll have my scouting report on the Patriots and will delve more into the strategy of beating Brady and his Boys. If you’re looking for information about the Patriots, take a gander at Pats Pulpit, our SB Nation blog dedicated to New England. I’ll being doing a 5 Questions segment with tommassee, the blogger over there sometime on Friday.
In the meantime, here’s some more stuff for you to peruse.
John Czarnecki has a good article about the game and more specifically about Brady vs. Romo. He also notes that it’s good for the NFL that our ‘Boys are back in the limelight.
The good thing for the NFL is that the Cowboys are back. The Cowboys are the Yankees of baseball. Fans either love them or hate them, but when they aren't competitive they become an afterthought. I mean, the Yankees being out of the playoffs remains a bigger story today than what two teams are still competing in the National League. The Cowboys haven't won a playoff game in 10 seasons, but they are positioned to be an NFC favorite right now.
It’s a good read and I recommend it.
Over at NFL.com the Total Access crew has a video analysis of the game, again focusing on Brady vs. Romo.
I thought that Brady vs. Romo would be the major subplot of the game, it turns out that Moss vs. Owens is going to give the QB’s a run for the money. Thanks to T.O.’s note on his locker for the press, everybody’s taking about #81 vs. #81. DC.com gets in on the action, here.
DC.com has this quote from Romo on facing a Bill Belichick defense.
"From watching them on tape I think what makes him probably special is just his ability to think like a quarterback," Romo said of Belichick. "When they know you're going to throw the ball, a lot of their schemes and such, they do a lot of things with their safeties to give you a different look.
"They'll give you a certain look and they'll start to run one way and then after a little bit they'll get back into what they're doing, whereas other teams don't want to be out of position. The Patriots will take the chance of getting out of position once in a while because they want to give the quarterback a different look, and they know that if you start in the wrong place it's probably going to be a bad play."
Holy trickeration! Romo has to be on the top of his game this week unlike the breakdown in Buffalo last week. I have confidence that Romo will do just that.
Here’s the New England injury report.
RB Laurence Maroney, who's missed the last two games with a groin injury, was at the media portion of practice, but was listed to have "limited participation" in practice. C Dan Koppen (who was also out Sunday), LB Adalius Thomas, WR Donte' Stallworth, Brady and CB Asante Samuel were all also listed as having "limited participation" at the full-pads workout. Brady (shoulder) has been listed on the injury report every day for the last four years.
Take that with a grain of salt, Belichick is renowned for fudging the injury list. But I admit that I think it’s hilarious that Tom Brady has been on every injury report for the last four years. That has to be a record.
While the two offenses in the All-American Bowl are the best the NFL has to offer this year statistically - although I’m sure the Colts would argue they are the best - the Dallas defense doesn’t match-up statistically with the Patriots defense.
The Cowboys have the eighth ranked defense, but their last three opponents – Buffalo, St. Louis and Chicago – have the 31st, 27th and 30th ranked offenses.
On Sunday, New England brings the NFL's second-ranked offense, led by quarterback Tom Brady, who has tied an NFL record with five straight games with at least three touchdown passes. The Patriots lead the league in points per game (26.4) and are second to the Cowboys in yards (427.8).
"This is the type of game we'll find out about what kind of defense we have," Spears said.
Indeed.
Nick Folk has been getting major ink since booting those two 53-yarders on Monday. But did you know he comes from a family of doctors? I guess more importantly, do you care?
At the risk of angering the Parcells bashers on the blog, I’m posting some comments from a couple of people who praise Parcells for putting together this roster.
For that, Cowboys inside linebacker Bradie James gives a hand to former Cowboys coach Bill Parcells for teaching these players to remain businesslike no matter what and concentrate on what's important.
"If Bill hadn't been here," James said before practice on Wednesday, "I don't think we could have overcome all these obstacles we've overcome."
And from John Czarnecki.
Give former coach Bill Parcells a lot of credit for the current roster. He's the one who stuck by Romo, the undrafted quarterback, when owner Jerry Jones was paying the likes of Quincy Carter, Chad Hutchinson and Drew Henson, a trio that today walks the league's unemployment line. Parcells also picked Ware over Shawne Merriman and the former seems to be the more complete player. T.O. is another question; Parcells could have done without him, but understood his playmaking ability.
Wow, someone outside of Cowboys Nation actually said that DeMarcus Ware might be the better pick that Shawne Merriman. I stayed out of those debates for the most part because I thought you can’t really tell until a few years down the road. Still, it’s nice to hear someone outside of Dallas fans say it.