Cowboys 'FishTips' Lead To Pounding Of Giants
By Mike Fisher | @fishsports
ARLINGTON (105.3 THE FAN) — Before every game, on Twitter and live on the official Dallas Cowboys pregame show 105.3 The Fan, we exercise our football muscles with "FishTips.''
It's a handful of observations — some representing statistical trends, some predicting logical outcomes, almost all emanating from inside a week at Valley Ranch — meant to guide fans to the knowledge of what it will take to win that week's game.
Much of it comes straight from Cowboys coaches and players, of course, as they begin that process before a Sunday game by meeting first thing Wednesday morning to face the weekly question posed by head coach Jason Garrett: "How do we win this week's game?''
The buildup to Cowboys 31, Giants 21 was no different. There was a formula, there were keys, and there were tips. Let's measure how our pregame FishTips matched up with real life:
TIP - The Cowboys believed that Jermey Parnell would not only hold up at right tackle, but that he might run-block better than Doug Free (sidelined with a foot injury). There might be double-team help from tight end Jason Witten here and chip help from DeMarco Murray there, but a focused Parnell, Dallas believed, would result in a successful Parnell -- especially as a run-blocker.
RESULT - "I think I proved something,'' Parnell told me following a win in which Dallas held a time-of-possession edge of 33:49 to 26:11, including a fourth-quarter advantage of 9:25 to 5:35. "I proved I can play in this league. I gave (the team) reason to have confidence in me. That feels good.''
TIP - Dallas has no pure speed-rusher at defensive end yet (though rookie DeMarcus Lawrence is pegged to be exactly that when he is eligible to be activated following Week 8). So the Cowboys get pressure in other ways and from other places, like Tyrone Crawford doing it from 3-tech. He came into the weekend with the same number of QB hurries (13) and QB hits (5) as Cowboys legend DeMarcus Ware has now that he's playing with the Broncos.
RESULT - "We don't just have 11 guys flying to the ball,'' Crawford told me. "It's, like, 22 guys flying to the ball.''
Once again, Dallas didn't quite get those sacks. But the defense forced two fumbles (more if the refs had agreed), Crawford had a hurry and Jeremy Mincey had two hurries of Eli Manning.
"We want those other numbers,'' the sack-hungry Mincey told me, "but if we keep working, they will come.''
TIP - The Cowboys saw the Giants' hurting secondary as vulnerable on Sunday, especially to Witten up the seam. Since 2000, Witten has 10 TDs vs. NYG, the most by any tight end. And he has 120 catches, the most by any receiver against the Giants. The table is set for similar damage.
RESULT - "We saw we could attack them up the seam,'' Gavin Escobar told me. "We definitely took advantage of that.''
Indeed. Though Witten caught just two balls for 27 yards, the same equation worked to benefit Escobar, the second-rounder from last year who impatient observers have labeled a bust. Escobar caught three passes for 65 yards, including TD strikes of 15 and 26 yards.
TIP - How do Cowboys rebound from West Coast trips? Since 1990, Dallas is 12-2 in following weeks. So a Seattle hangover is avoidable.
RESULT- "This looked a lot like the Seattle game,'' said QB Tony Romo, meaning that the same foundation that allowed the Cowboys to record last week's monumental win on the road against the defending champs was present here.
There's no hangover, you know, if you simply stay drunk on success every single Sunday.
TIP - The Cowboys have an essential solution to the threat of defensive lineman Jason Pierre-Paul: Run AT him.
RESULT - Pierre-Paul did his damage, participating in six tackles and recording a pair of sacks. I believe left tackle Tyron Smith — who politely declined comment to me after the game, likely because the perfectionist was disappointed in his work — will go back to the drawing board here.
But Dallas rolled up 423 yards, and maybe when the Cowboys review film they'll see that JPP was but a blip on the radar here.
TIP - DeMarco Murray would continue to roll towards the record books: He totaled 785 yards in this year's first six games. In 1984, Eric Dickerson's record season, he'd totaled 605 through six games.
RESULT - "The way we run the ball … this is the best we've ever been on third down,'' said Romo. "Third-and-3 looks a lot like third-and-8 to us right now. … DeMarco is at the highest level at his position. Dez is at the highest level at his position … It's hard for teams to figure out what to take away.''
And in the end — with Murray rushing for 128 yards to become the only player in NFL history to start a season with seven consecutive 100-yard games — teams don't take anything away.
TIP - The Cowboys have started 6-1 on nine occasions in their history. They've made the playoffs all nine of those times, qualified for the Conference Championship Game six times, and won two Super Bowls.
RESULT - Your Cowboys have started 6-1.
(©2014 CBS Local Media, a division of CBS Radio Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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