Mailbag question and answers from DC.com

Dallas Cowboys ✭
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One thing that bothered me last year and frankly in a lot of seasons before, is when an injury to a star came up, the Cowboys, unlike other teams (Eagles especially), don’t seem to be good at the “next man up” philosophy? Whether it was Lee or Smith, or Zeke (due to suspension) or even back to Romo a few years ago. When players like them went down, the next game or games were brutal performances especially games like Atlanta last year. Is there a reason for this? Do you think the coaches will change approaches with backups this year, more reps in practice or something? Philly won the Super Bowl with Nick Foles, I’m just saying … why can’t we do adapt like other teams? - Josh Hanson / San Antonio , TX

Bryan: Eagles won a Super Bowl with players around Nick Foles. If you wanted to use Jason Peters as an example, I’d agree. You had some young kids step up in some spots. When Scandrick went down Awuzie and Lewis had to play a bigger role. They have players that are capable of playing well when needed. Not trying to read you wrong but I believe you’re still mad about Chaz Green?

David: Simply put, I just think the Cowboys have misevaluated their depth in recent years. Back in 2015, they bargain-hunted for backup quarterbacks and it cost them. You could argue the same thing about their linebacker depth. They had a solid backup tackle in Chaz Green and spent a year trying to move him to guard. Meanwhile, the Eagles went out and did aggressive things to acquire better players – like trading for Jay Ajayi and paying a high price for a quality backup quarterback in Nick Foles. The Cowboys’ decisions to sign Cam Fleming and draft Leighton Vander Esch indicate that, hopefully, this is a lesson they’ve learned.

BOTH OF THESE ANSWERS ARE W R O N G!!!
The real reason the Cowboys can’t recover from injuries is coaching and coaching period!!!
Not only did the Eagles lose Wentz, they lost Peters, Sproles AND a LB (forgot name)
Other teams adjust just like that freaking bozo Pederson did when Wentz went down. He changed the whole game plan to fit what he had.

To make matters worse the guy who filled in for Peters wouldn’t be a back up on this OL!

It’s all coaching and it’ll always be coaching

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I definitely agree to an extent

They should have planned to give our replacement OTs more help than they did. However, their coaching wasn’t going to make those guys acceptable backup LTs. And there were a number of times where they DID get help from a RB/TE on the outside, so their only job was to make sure they didn’t get beat inside…and sure enough, they let the guys blow by them on the inside.

We simply didn’t have quality depth at LB to cover for both Hitch and Lee to be out at the same time, and on defense you can’t really scheme out deficiencies at LB.

RB, we had the depth, and were able to run the ball very well despite Zeke being out. There really wasn’t an issue there, we simply couldn’t throw the ball post-atlanta. Due to the first issue we brought up at LT, subsequently Dak getting shook up, and then WRs not being able to pull in the ones that DID make it to them.

Then, like they mentioned, we did have guys step up at CB, and we didn’t miss scandrick at all (imo).

what the eagles did last year was absolutely phenomenal, and should be what your target is for injury recovery. but is there another SB championship team that’s comparable? Losing your franchise QB, your LT, and your stud LB, but still winning it all? last year I think is the exception, and shouldn’t be what’s expected. We should do better than what WE did last year though.

Luckily, I look at what we did in the offseason, and I think we corrected a lot of the mistakes last year. Our LG was a concern, our swing OT was a concern, our LB depth was a concern. This year, we landed a stud OLer in the 2nd round to plug into LG, we picked up a solid backup OT in Fleming, and we drafted a LB in the first round. Unfortunately we lost a couple items in our receiving department. Not having an expected #1 WR could end up hurting us, and I’m definitely prepared for that to happen (BECAUSE of the coaches…I still don’t think you need a proven #1 with this offense that will be centered around running and PA), but as for the lack of TE depth, if you have a losing season because you don’t have a stud TE, you’ve got much larger issues. A TE shouldn’t break the offense.

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ok…

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…yes I think the organization filled a number of sour spots from last year.
They also picked a young decent QB that they can developed…hopefully they’ll
keep 3 QBs in the 53…???
The WRs should be efficient in moving the chains along with the RBs, much like the 2016 season.
I’m still a little concerned about the defensive backfield, and the TEs…But there’s still a few pre-season games to be played…still time to evaluate or bring in some help.
I believe they have improved some of the coaching positions…but JG is still there.
What will he be like this season???