GBag Nation
2nd hour of the G-Bag Nation: NFL News of the Day; Cowboys Insider John Owning joins the Nation to talk Cowboys Football; Crusty's Corner: Broaddus takes a look at the Giants Defense
This podcast is brought to you by Men's Tea Clinic. Men's Tea Clinic is the team I trust with my total wellness optimization, and so should you. Five DFW locations with North Frisco Eldorado Parkway at Dallas, North Tolway, now open. Call 972-go-men's tea or visit mensteclinic.com. ♪ He's better over here ♪ AT&T customers, switching to T-Mobile has never been easier. We'll pay off your adjusting phone and give you a new one free, all on America's largest 5G network. Visit T-Mobile.com/carrierfreedom to switch today. Pay off up to $650 for your virtual prepaid master card in 15 days, free phone up to $830 for your 24 month in bill credits plus tax, qualifying, port and trade and service on Go 5G next to credit required. Contact us before canceling entire account to continue bill credits to credit, stop and balance and require finance agreements due. Post-season baseball is here and it is the absolute best time of the year. I'm Rod Bradford of Baseball's and Boring, and we're gonna have you covered every step of the way with instant reactions from players and coaches and managers and fans and reporters and everybody else who is immersed in this awesomeness and all the craziness that comes with October baseball. So follow baseball as I'm Boring in the free Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts. (upbeat music) - It's hour number two of the Gback Nation here on 1053. The fan welcome in. Flagtober 2024 starts at Firewheel Wedaburger Saturday morning at 9 a.m. We'll make a big ol' loop around DFW handing out free flags at every stop. It goes until 6.30 in Grand Prairie and you can get the whole schedule right now. 105 through the fan.com/events. We have John owning Pro Football Focus coming up here in 20 minutes. Time now for your NFL news today, here's chief. You know, there's a lot of metrics that you could look at to help defend DAC right now and really the DAC defenders should have this one in their back pocket. We know the average separation is very, very poor with these receivers. We know that there's no rushing attack to speak of. We know that the defense is absolutely embarrassing. And so DAC not getting much help. I mean, I can't help but look at different scenarios around the sport and just continue to be reminded how much coaching actually matters and how much guys are being helped from the sideline. Are there coaches just out there saying, man, if I have great players, then we can win. But if I don't have great players, then we're screwed. Then what are you doing? What are you doing then? - Join the club. - What's your role here? Yes, I would imagine there's a lot of guys out there that can stand on the sidelines of winning football teams that have dominant rosters from top to bottom. Sure, dude. You know, Jason Garrett, love to do that. You know, next man up, just, you know, it doesn't matter. You guys green, I know you're not Tyron Smith, but you're your next man up. So we're not going to change anything about the way we call offense here. You just have to emulate a Hall of Fame tackle because that's all I know how to do as a coach is just to tell you to go be Tyron Smith, even though you're Chaz Green. And that's just an extreme example of what a coach that isn't very good would do. And so right now brought us and Bobby did some of the research on this. Yeah. The first 15 plays stood out to you. It's like, man, these scripted plays, like your game plan, this is your plan offensively. What were some of your issues? What are you seeing that's aggravating you? Me? Yeah. I just don't feel like that, you know, the other day you made it a point that you wanted the ball and you brought up the way that the play. Now, you win the coin toss. It's like, hey, let's go get a lead 'cause we know we're front runners. We better have a lead. So let's get the ball and let's go do something with it. And they just beat down their leg. They peed down their leg. They got penalties on the play. I mean, there were a lot of things that happened to them, but I just don't see, I just don't see them attacking the way they need to. You know what I mean? Yes. You know, to me, it's, you know, it's, and to me, if they were to come out the other day and got into like a, I could just start of the game in two minutes and just said, okay, we're going to attack, attack, you know, and then you're trying to run the ball. You really can't run the ball. Now you're in some, you know, you're in some situations. You're behind the sticks. You're going to try and throw the waggle at, you know, you look, you get a defensive holding call to give you a first down on that, or that would have been a three. That's because of the year. Yeah. I mean, to me, it's, I just don't, when you, where you should be an attacking style of an offense, they're not. And I, and I just wonder if somebody over there would tell me if the head coach just does not have faith, early in a game that is young offensive lineman are going to hold up, that maybe he gets into a game and he's kind of like feeling it out to see if his guys are going to have struggles. Because in the, you know, in the third and the fourth, they opened that thing up, but they were behind. But that's, that's the kind of attitude they need to have. It's running three receivers on, running three receivers off, switching up the backs, throwing to the tie it in, throwing it to a back. Now throw it, don't just throw slants all day and think, those are the plays they make, but they had some good pass plays in that third and fourth that were good routes. They created separation. They created opportunity. They played with some pace, some, some energy, some effort. You know, their pass blocking held up, their backs held up, you know, when they had to run the ball, they were able to run the ball a little bit. They threw a screen, that worked. You know, that's where this, this, I would expect this to be with the receiver they have, the quarterback they have, the tied in they have. I expect that to be a little bit more. Yeah, Zeke is a liability, but what do they do? They took Zeke off the field. And that third, fourth, then they went with Hunter Lipke, they went with Dattle, they went with Vaughn. Take the negative players off the field and then go attack. Yeah, well, one of the metrics that we have now is the quarterbacks on their first read. How often is your quarterback throwing it to his first read and what type of production do you get from this? And I think this is, certainly it's a quarterback stat to some extent, but I think this is a, this is a play call or stat. This is a, this is a, an offense. What is your scheme? How is your scheme helping you? 'Cause it's your first read. So how often is your quarterback seeing the first read and it's open? You designed it well. Hey, this is what we're trying to accomplish on this play. This is the guy I want you to throw it to. And then we'll go progression by progression here. And, you know, if that first guy is not open. For the Cowboys, Dak Prescott, there's only two quarterbacks in the league right now that are throwing to their first read more often. It's Trevor Lawrence and it's Daniel Jones, okay? So Dak is consistently throwing it to the guy that your offense has drawn it up for. The problem is, is there's only three quarterbacks in the league that have worse production on those plays. So you're consistently throwing it to the guy that your coach is telling you to throw it to because it's the first read and you are getting some of the worst production on those plays. You're getting what you want. The guy was actually open and it's generating very little. That's, I would think, well done, chief. Well, because, I mean, you see it in the opening, in those first 15 plays, you're, it's not checked down to the running back because my four receivers down the field weren't open. So I just had to get rid of the ball. They're throwing it to where our first read is our slow running back where we're not sure catches the ball very well and we're gonna throw it to him at the line of scrimmage. That's your first read on a play. That's supposed to be a checkdown and if it's not, it's got to be designed in a way where you've got, you've got the cavalcade of blockers out in front and it's okay. We got a swing pass and we got 10 yards on it 'cause that's about as most as you could hope for on a play like that. But you're getting back to the line of scrimmage because you're just, you're just having your age to running back, run out into the flat and that's your first read. So you're throwing it to your first read all the time and you're getting no production out of it. That tells me your offense is just garbage. Yeah and it's predictable. I think that's one of the main things is I often feel like the defense is just waiting for you to throw it short so they can rally to the football again and again and again. There's no imagination to get them running the way and then throwing it back. You don't threaten them enough with your running game to force them into a heavy box or needing to blitz you in a way that would allow you to take advantage over the top with the screen. There's just, there's not a lot going on. I don't know what the right answers are chief. I don't watch the film like Brian but I believe the only thing they can do is try to throw it deeper and accept that the picks are gonna come. We might have a game where there's three or four picks but dang it, we gotta try to throw in there and only have like one interception this game. I just, that's how our offense could work. I don't know if this helps the argument at all or it just something but I was just looking at something in the matchup with Dak and the Giants and stuff but this is something they kind of talk about with tight windows and they say Dak tight window on 35% of his past attempts in week three. That's the highest rate in a game since week four of 2018 for him. - Wow. - Prescott struggled completing his tight window attempts against the Ravens. He was five of 18 for 66 yards. - So it does remind me of the time before I'm Ari Cooper. - Yeah, yeah. - Prescott more than doubled his rate of open receiver targets in the fourth quarter, 33%, compared to 15% of open targets rate in the first three quarters of that game. - So that's guys getting more open? - Yeah. - Yeah. - They weren't playing preven but were they playing off coverage? Did they adjust anything? - They were bringing pressure. It was really, they were playing the same. It's like Dallas said, oh, we need to attack here or we need to, oh, let's match up here. 'Cause it wasn't CD land that was helping Nick. And as I talked to you earlier, it was like, hey, wait a minute, we got Tobit on this guy. We can, they kind of figured out. - Turpin. - Yeah, they got turpin. They got Washington to safety matched up against Turpin. You know, you could scheme that. - Right. - There's ways to scheme your guys open and all of a sudden I'm going, wow, look at this. You know, a route combination. All of a sudden they're playing cover two in the middle of the defense opens up because of a route combination. All of a sudden maybe the guy they jumped Ferguson in a route and that leaves Tolbert in the middle of the field where Dax just hits him for a touchdown, you know? Or, oh, wait, hey, they've got Turpin on the safety here. See, that's where, I just don't understand how, and all I had, I'm a guy with a microphone here. That's all I am. I mean, at one time I used to evaluate teams and pro personnel stuff. But I always look at matchups as like, who can I take advantage of? Who is the weak link of this group? - And they only started doing that in the fourth quarter. - It appeared to me that that's all of a sudden they figured out like, oh, wait a minute, Stevens can't cover very well. Let's target him. Oh, wait, they're going to put Washington on this guy. Let's go after this. And then the protection, the backs did a great job, the line did a great job. Dax was able to kind of manipulate, find where he wanted to go with the ball. They played with some pace. They had the Ravens on their heels a little bit, but it seems like everybody you play attacks your weakness. It's like every, you watch the tape, you're like, oh man, they knew something about you there. - Well, it's like the most elementary level of just football understanding. - I don't know how you go in the game. - Taking advantage of what your team-- - I don't know how. - The opposition doesn't do well. - Okay, for example, we talked about last week that the falala, the guard for the Ravens, not very quick-footed, big guy. What they do, they put Micah Parsons on him, rushed him in the middle, got a pressure in complete pass. Okay, how hard? - Do it again. - How hard? That's, I just don't, I understand everybody else you play finds your players that are struggling in a game. And you don't do that nearly enough here. I don't think you take advantage of players that they're maybe trying to hide. Maybe they're thinking like, oh, this guy's not a very good run defender. Oh, maybe this guy's not a little bit of, he's not, maybe he doesn't play the pass very well. Like Flock, the corner for the Giants, number 28. If he has to play, I'm throwing every single ball at him. 'Cause he is going to give it up. He's going to give it a place. He doesn't want to play tight. He doesn't want to play up on you. He doesn't want to be physical. So, hey, go after guys up, but they won't, they'll go after the other guy. They'll go after banks and banks likes to play tight. Now, he'll give up some plays. But find the guys that can't play. That's what bothers me so much about this offense. It's like we're just running plays. Like, oh, hey, let's run the waggle here. No, attack this corner over here that can't cover. Block it up, attack a corner, attack a linebacker, Rowquan Smith, he was struggling in coverage. You know, you look at them, he gave up over 100 yards of receptions in this game. How can the Cal, Kansas City get him matched up in coverage? And we're just like, nah, we're not interested. We're not very interested, but he gives up plays. That just drives me nuts. When I watch the Cowboys and what a struggle it is on offense. And other teams are just killing your defense. They're like, hey, their right ends can't play run defense here. - There is some optimism, you know, and there, it's a great rant, Brian, by the way. - Oh, I'm sorry. - Tremendously informative. You know, I really like when you get into that mode. - Do you watch the games and feel like that, like everybody else that plays offense against you has it pretty easy at times? - Yeah. - Where you're like, oh my God, that was a good design right there. - Yeah. - You know, how do they, how do they all of a sudden, how do all of a sudden did they figure out how to get a third team tied in on one of your players? And it turns into a 37 yard gain or 36 yard gain. Or they get Nelson Aguilar, who has, you know, to a, you know, now you have a missed tackle over there, but they got him on a rookie player. They throw him the ball and now here we go. You know, it's, this game is about match ups and being able to take advantage of those. You know, what did the Saints do? They ran, they ran their fastest player through your safeties 'cause they know neither one of these safeties could play the ball over their head. That's a match up, what happens? That's six, 70 yard pass play, you know, one play, 70 yards, five second drive time. Why? Because they said we're gonna run this, we're gonna run our fastest players on your safeties who can't turn and run. - Yeah, I do think in that fourth quarter when you talk about things getting better for them, it felt to me like they're, they were actually running more routes where receivers were on the move, more over routes, more crossing routes. - Yes, it opened up, - Exactly. - It opened up opportunities. The Texas routes, the screen routes. I mean, Texas, it's, they go outside, you go inside and you throw the ball underneath and, or it's put CD lamb in the backfield and throw it to him and let him gain 14 or 15 yards. You know, that was something that, we don't see that. We don't see that. - Well, Brian, it sounds like there's, you know, if you had a different coaching staff, you believe this group of players could perform significantly better than what we've seen so far. - I just, I just wonder how much-- - I think offensively, yes. Defensively, I have more concerns. - Yeah, I think defensively there's things that Zimmer can't, just can't do, you know. And I love Mike and I think that, Mike will tell you it ain't the players. Mike will take the heat on this one. You know, he'll, he'll take the blame that they're not playing good run defense right now. You know, but he could play a 5-2. When he's played 5-2 defense, his guys have played pretty well. - Yeah, but then you're susceptible in some other big ways and, you know, it's just, it's Band-Aids and all of a sudden you're gonna have other huge issues. But it's, I'll tell you what, Rex Ryan, he is, he's taking some shots, he's lashing out, he's pointing the finger. - He enjoys doing that for his brother, Rob. - Yeah. - You know, there's still some hard feelings there in the family. - We'll hear from sexy, Rex, he a little bit later on in the program. - I love it, I love it. And I love Flaktober 2024, which you'll be underway Saturday morning, 9 a.m. You can get the whole schedule, 1-0-5 to the fan.com/events. Join us on Saturday and get your free 2024 Whataburger flag. There's things iconic. It's gonna be one of the best ever. And John owning pro football focus joins us next. We'll get his thoughts on what the Cowboys can do to adjust next. ♪ It's better over here ♪ - Now at T-Mobile, get four 5G phones on us and four lines for $25 a line per month when you switch with eligible trade-ins. All on America's largest 5G network. (upbeat music) - Minimum of four lines for $25 per line per month without a paid discount using debit or bank account. $5 more per line without auto pay plus taxes and fees and $10 device connection charge. Phones be at 24 monthly bill credits for well qualified customers. Contact us before canceling entire account to continue bill credits or credit stop and balance on a required finance agreement too. Bill credits end if you pay off devices early. CTmobile.com. - Post season baseball is here and it is the absolute best time of the year. I'm Rod Bradford of baseballs and boring and we're gonna have you covered every step of the way with instant reactions from players and coaches and managers and fans and reporters and everybody else who is immersed in this awesomeness and all the craziness that comes with October baseball. So follow baseballs and boring in the free Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts. (upbeat music) Next to the nation. Welcome back nation. Here we go. John owning pro football focus set to join you here on home of the Cowboys. Talk about what's ailing this football team and if there's still reason for hope, segments brought to you by the Frankel's life's unpredictable accidents happen. If you are a loved one is hurt in an accident due to somebody's negligence called the Frankel's. Get your free consultation. Two, one, four or eight, one, seven, three, three, three, 33, 33, go to FrankelFirm.com. I hope you can join us in our tour day DFW on Saturday. We're coming to the Whataburger nearest you and giving you a free flag. You just got to check out the schedule on our socials. As joining us now from pro football focus is one of our favorite football guests, John owning here in the nation. And a good even sir, how the heck are you? Man doing well really excited to talk some run defense or maybe lack thereof today. Yeah, yeah, what have you been focusing on as far as what ails the Cowboys? What's the biggest point of emphasis for you? I really think there's kind of two. I think there's one that I really, everybody has been harping on. I've heard Brian and Zach and a lot of others in our Cowboys media space where they harp on the execution. There was, especially when you're talking about the classic under center running plays. Plays where Mazi Smith gets kindly escorted out of this gap. Donovan Wilson just jumps out of his gap on another one that doesn't make sense. Overshown somehow blows up a block and misses a tackle. At the same exact time, those kind of plays, I think those kind of, the Miss tackles obviously was something that plagued the Cowboys extensively the last couple of weeks. And, but I think one kind of execution error that not a lot of people are focusing on but that it makes a huge difference, especially in a defense when they were playing so much single high, I think they played 73% of their snaps against Baltimore Ravens came from single high. So they were kind of loading the box trying to stop the run. But when you're loading the boss and trying to stop the run is you have to do good with your fallback principles. And what I'm talking about fallback principles is when an offense brings a blocker from one side to the other post snap, it adds, it takes away a gap from the side that you would have aligned on. And it adds a gap to the side that he's coming post snap. So for example, say an offense is in a class, you know, shotgun set, they have a, they're in 11 personnel, so three receivers on the field, one tied in and one running back. So they're, the running back is running shotgun to the quarterback's left. There's a tied end aligned, you know, on the line of scrimmage or maybe in a wing set to the right of the formation. So to the defenses left, there's going to be four gaps. There's going to be A, B, C and the D gap pre snap. And then to the defenses right, which is the weak side, there's going to be three gaps. There's going to be an A, B and C gap. But what happens when that offense brings that tied end from the strong side to the quote unquote pre snap weak side is it takes away a guess. So now on what was the defenses, on the defenses left, which was the strong side, there is now only three gaps. There's an A, B and a C gap. Whereas now on the pre snap weak side, it is now the strong side post snap. So there's an A, B, C and a D gap there. And so you need to account for that somehow. And one way you have to do that is you have to have your linebackers fall back eight gaps. So they were protecting, filling four gaps on that play side, pre snap post snap. They only have, you know, maybe there's only three gaps there now, so they have to fall back their gaps towards the post snap strong side. So if they don't do that, it leaves them a gap down. There's a three, there's going to be two people on the defenses left that are going to be in the same gap. And that means there's going to be a day-kitted gap on the defenses right post snap. And I think that's something that the Cowboys line back in group in particular has consistently gotten wrong over the past couple of years. And it's made the Cowboys defense is kind of unsound. And I think that kind of execution errors is kind of why you see running backs find free daylight when they cut back. So consistently against the Cowboys defense. And I think that's something that's really hurt them. But another thing I wanted to focus on is, especially against the Ravens is the Cowboys defending the quarterback-centric run game, you know, when Lamar Jack, especially against someone like Lamar Jack, he was so athletic and so fast. The thing that people don't realize is is when you're playing a single high defense, the reason why you're doing it is 'cause you're going to load the gap and have a defense, one defender in the box for each gap that is created by the offense. But that is done under the offices that the quarterback is not going to be involved in the run game. Because when the quarterback gets involved in the run game, what was once defense was cleanly had a man for every gap. Now that the quarterback is running the ball, it adds in a gap that the defense has to cover. So that means that the defense is now going to be one gap down from what they should have been, from what they would have been if the quarterback wasn't involved. So that means you have to have the safety, the deep safety insert into the run game. But when you're playing single high shells, the safety is so far deep. He's 15 to 18 yards in the middle of the field. He's not in a place where he can insert into the run game quickly enough to be able to make an impact. And that's why you saw Lamar Jackson when they were bringing that tied in across the formation and adding a blocker to the QB read side. It was creating situations where the Cowboys would have only one defender over there and that defender was already accounted for by the blocker, they were a man down. And I think that a lot of that comes from is Mike DeSimmer's kind of, for lack of a better term, stubbornness to play single high gapped out defense. Now, what you're seeing a ton of teams do nowadays is they're gonna play split safeties in those situations. Now, people think because you're playing split safeties or inviting them to run the ball and you're not in their position to be able to defend the run, but you're in a much more, even though you're in not as good of a position to defend the one, 'cause you have less people available in the box, there are things you can do like playing gap in a half if you're in an even man front or playing two gap if you're in an odd man front to kind of make up for the lack of defenders that you have in the box. But what you do have is you have two safeties that are aligned much closer to the line of scrimmage and they have much better leverage to perimeter runs. That's why when you see teams play a lot of two high, they play spill defense, which means they're trying to string everything towards the sidelines so that those safeties can insert into the run and make it much more sound. And that's what you have to do against the QB run game. That's why you see defenses in colleges, obviously the hash marks play a big part into it, but you play split safeties because you can have those safeties insert into the run and account for the QB in those zone read, those power read, those bash runs, those things that create such big plays when you see these defenses playing, those classic single high cover one cover three defenses, it's like the Cowboys were playing. But the Cowboys, I don't think they had the tools, they were consistently out adapting into those QB runs with Lamar Jackson and that's why you consistently saw the Baltimore Raven to get whatever they wanted. Anytime they went to a zone read with Lamar Jackson, they were creating big explosive gains and that's because they were stubbornly hanging out in single high, not giving their defense the tools, in my opinion, to be able to adequately defend those plays. - John, so a lot of it just, you're thinking they get out flanked in a way. And then when, okay, how do you account for when you get, say, edges that play like that crash technique where all of a sudden Micah and tanking those guys are going, where is, and I was thinking, where's the replacement player or the Phil player there? So that would be your safety if you sat there and covered two then, right? That would be your-- - It would be similar that the linebacker is going to have to scrape. Now when he's scraping, he's going to have a player who is outside so that they can create a vice on the blocker, so if you have a blocker, you have, depending on who the blocker is going to take, the key takes, the safety that's coming down the Phil, the safety is going to play with outside leverage on that block and funnel. - Right. - Lamar Jackson inside to that linebacker, whereas if that tire then takes, you know, Kendrick's, he's just going to take on the block with inside leverage, so they eat funnels Lamar Jackson to Jonathan Wilson. Obviously, it creates a one-on-one tackling situation in the open field against Lamar Jackson. It's not ideal, but it's really the best you can ask for in those situations when you have, when you're playing, you know, all your players are, you're so concerned about the downhill running game of, in stretch running game of Derek Henry and Justin Hill and your defensive tackles aren't doing a good job, so you have so much of the personnel inside, you know, if getting a one-on-one unblocked defender against Lamar Jackson is really the best that you can ask for. - Yeah, see, what I've also noticed too, and I know you watched, like you watched the tape, you see, I see Dallas just trying like hell because they've been beating up so bad on the edges that they've got everybody trying to run to the ball and then that has allowed some cutback lanes to be pretty prevalent for them. - 100%, and that's why I kind of think Zimmer's kind of game plan that he traded against the Baltimore Ravens were providing answers to the problems that the Cowboys found against the week before. - The Saints, yeah. - And they weren't, yeah, against the Saints and, but they weren't adequately enough addressing the problems that the Baltimore Ravens can create. - Yeah. - So I think that was something that kind of, I think Zimmer was kind of going into, like even having so much trouble, defending the box runs, you know, these zone stretches, these inside zone plays, these gap plays, we're just gonna throw personnel in there. And to be honest, the week before Lamar Jackson, I think only had two or three designed runs. So he was probably thinking, you know, they're not gonna, this early in the season, they maybe won't try to get the Mar Jackson exposed to that much punishment, that much physicality. So he was kind of banking on hoping that the Baltimore Ravens weren't gonna do that, but obviously we saw from almost the jump that Ravens were gonna have Lamar Jackson be a big point of their running game, especially 'cause they were 0-2 going to this kind of must-win game. - Talking Cowboys with John Oning here on the fan, when you look at this Cowboys offense right now, John, what do you see? What is the most frustrating? Is it the rushing attack? Is it the bad route concepts? I mean, what is the offense doing to you right now as you look at it? - I mean, honestly, the offense reminds me a ton of what we saw the first six weeks of last year before the bi-week, you know, really unimaginative route concepts and passing concepts we saw. The thing is, people are saying they're not using like shifts or motions, but they are, but they're not with enough urgency that create those voids in a defense. They're kind of just jogging to their place, getting set up, using shifts, even when they're using motion at the snap. It's not like the urgency that you see like the 49ers use it with or the dolphins use it with, or the packers use it with these teams that are so good, so prolific offensively when they're totally healthy. And it's because that they're doing these things that are manipulating the defense quickly with their fastest players and that's creating voids, it's creating communication errors. And it's making easy offense for their quarterback. And that's the problem that they're running back in the running game. And that's the thing that the Cowboys aren't doing offensively schematically. They're not giving, you know, DAAC or RICO or Zeke, these easy button wins that the other elite offenses are consistently doing. - We love how you break down football, John. Thank you so much for your time and enjoy week four. - I appreciate you guys hopefully. Next week, it'll be a lot happier than it does this week. - Yeah, yeah, no doubt, we could use it, especially against this Giants team. Thank you, sir. - Thank you. - John owning pro football focus here in the G back nation on 1053, the fan. Jive with what you're seeing, Brian, let's find out more. - Yeah, I'll tell you what, he was and John's excellent at what he does. I just felt like too, he's right about the flanking, out flanking in some of the ways where, you know, the edges and stuff just haven't been good enough, but they're winning so quickly on the outside. And what John's talking about with the gapping, the spacing and all that. I mean, it could kind of give you a tired head a little bit, but everything about it is that when you're running a ball on the edges, you know, you're trying to win. And if you can do it by, you know, by spacing or by having extra blockers there, it's always gonna be something that the offense is going to strive to try and do. - What do you have coming up next in the corner? - I'm gonna talk about the New York Giants defense and we'll do that next. - My three year old loves this song. I don't know how she's been listening to it, but she will now request it. - She's like an arrhythmic fan? - She knows a lot of the lyrics to it. - That's you, really. - Which is kind of unsettling at times, but yeah, you know, it's the jam. I believe it is a national one hit wonder day. I don't know if the rhythmics are one of those, but it's got those kind of eighties one hit wonder. - Oh, no, the rhythmics, I think they had a few more, had a few more hits than like say like aha or one of those groups or something like that. - Yeah. - That was the eight, and here comes the rain again, falling in the face like a memory. - Yeah. - That love brought us karaoke. - Oh, man. - Resty's corner is brought she by reliant air conditioning, gimmick-free AC repair and replacement. Here's the king. - Thank you very much, General Appreciate. Thank you, John Oning too, for coming on. - Outstanding report. - Man, I mean, he can explain a little gap defense for you a little bit. I like that. - I think that was the longest answer we've had since PJ Carlissima. - It was. - Yeah. - For sure. - It was long, but. - He was on his Vince Lombardi chalkboard. - He was. - I think I could hear him. - We have a seal here, a seal here, and we're gonna run the ball, you know. - That's, yeah. - You gotta go back to the pre-snap strong side. - Yeah. - It could be a little difficult talking about strong and weak sides. - He's gotta do it when he's drinking his hands, like coach JB. - Yeah. (laughing) - He dropped a few F bombs. - He got fresh gin and tonic right here. He's running back. (laughing) - Can you tell it's a drink? - Yeah, you could tell. - How people hold it? The pinky is always up now, people. When they drink a drink, they drink it by the top of it, when they smack all in it. - Like a lot of ice and a lot of. - No, you could tell. - Like a lime fluid around. - I'm shaking around, man. - You know what I mean? - 'Cause I tell you, these moms have figured out these Yeti cups, by the way. - Oh, yeah. - These moms, these moms will show up at these with these Yetis. They've figured them out. - Yeah, you could tell 'cause they don't put them down next to them. - They know the whole time. - The whole time. - There's alcohol in there. - They're like, "Hey, mom, let me know, no." - I'm learning you don't have to be that wary of the early morning Yeti. It's the late afternoon. - The late afternoon. - Which probably started as an early morning yet. - Tournament. - Yes, yes, she's got that bottle of Chardonnay in there. She keeps filling it back up. - The late games can get spicy. - Start off with a bloody mary, or maybe-- - Oh, I know. (laughing) - Gotta love that, gotta love it. All right, the giants defensively, we'll get into this a little bit. They've got some questions in their secondary. We've mentioned that Adori Jackson, who's been playing Israel, he's a backup corner for them. He's had to play a little bit more because Nick McLeod, who is their starter at left corner, has been dealing with a knee injury. He hurt the knee in the Minnesota game, which was week one. He's missed the last two games, but Nick should be back in action. So that means they get one of their starters back, but they lose Adori and they lose Drew Phillips, who is a very talented rookie nickel player from Kentucky. He's a little bit smaller guy. Was third round selection by the giants, kind of felt like that maybe he should have been selected a little bit higher, but this draft was really deep with a lot of really quality cornerbacks and people probably didn't fall in love with his size and all that, but they lost a big player there. So now it's going to be where to see-- - This is where you wanna take advantage, right? Here's a match up. - There's a couple different ways you can play this thing, and the one way you can do it, and this is gonna be LSU Crime on LSU Crime right here, is that with Cordell Flott, who is number 28, is one of their corners, and when he plays, he is not as physical, nor is he as aggressive, as what you get, say, when you have, when you win Deontay Banks or even with Nick McLeod and Phillips and guys like that. So the Cowboys would do themselves well, if they could find a way to get the ball in the direction and match up as much as they can with number 28 Cordell Flott. That's the guy that I feel like if you could go after, you can make some plays against him. Banks, people have kind of gone after Banks on the other side. He was a first round pick in 2023. People have gone after him a little bit, but he's more willing to play you tough, be up on you, be more competitive. So that's maybe you wanna stay, if you're not interested in making some tight window throws, you'd go to the other side there, but try and find number 28 if you can. What you have to be worried about the secondary, though, is they have a very talented blitzer in Jason Pinnock, and he plays usually as the free safety. He wears number 27. He's tied actually with the lead, the team lead with the sacks, and it's so funny with this team, when you figured that you've got Brian Burns and Cave-on Thibodeau, that those two would be the leaders in sacks, but no, it's Dexter Lawrence. And so got to be careful about, when 27 gets around the line of scrimmage, he's likely gonna be coming on a blitz. And so the running backs, we saw a really nice job with last week with Dattle, with Hunter Lippke, those kinds of guys picking up blitzes, and hopefully that they are well aware of Jason Pinnock, and then also two linebacker, Micah McFadden is another guy that kind of blitzes, and this had some pressure. So if the Giants are gonna bring pressure, that's probably where it's gonna come from, and that either the secondary or that linebacker pressure. Now, I mentioned about the, I talked about Brian Burns, and I talked about Thibodeau, two very talented edge players. Dallas is gonna have their hands full, especially if you look at where, Guyton was much better in the later in that game. He was really much better last week than it came to the feet and the hands. They're going to flip Thibodeau and Burns to each side. So they're going to try and find ways to take advantage of you with their edge rushers. So both, when you start talking about with Guyton and steel need to be ready for Thibodeau and Burns, because those are gonna be their two pressure players on the edge. - Those guys can get you. - Those guys can get you. And the thing about Thibodeau and Burns, both, they can break you down. And when we saw last week, when Guyton gets in trouble is when he doesn't move his feet. As long as he can move his feet, he's got the length and the reach to kind of keep these guys at arms length and also keep them away from the play. Another road game for him here. You know, he hadn't had a road game since week one. Crowd's gonna be into it, I'm sure. You know, he's gotta be able to get off on the snap count. Feet, hands are gonna be important for working against both of these guys because those guys can get to the edge on him. The biggest matchup is gonna be inside. And it's gonna be how you deal with Dexter Lawrence. And Dexter Lawrence is a, is a guy that, you know, he's-- - Probably best in the league. - Big and fast. - He's big and he is fast and he's powerful and he will walk your center directly back into the pocket. And we're several times these games I've been watching, you know, with the Vikings in week one, the commanders in week two, and especially with the Browns in week three. He will just take your center and walk him, push him straight back into the quarterback. And the one thing we've seen with Dak Prescott is he's very much on board with going forward in the pocket and throwing these balls. So, you know, Cooper BB is gonna kind of-- - Oh yeah, how's he doing so far? - Yeah, Cooper BB-- - Could he handle power? - Yeah, the thing that the Cooper BB is a strong guy. This guy has a different level of strength you're about to block. So, Cooper can sit down. He's got some power in his lower body, his upper body power. He's a shorter guy, he can kind of handle that, but where he's probably gonna need some help is, he's gonna need some help from Martin, and he's gonna need a little help from Smith if they can do that. Now, I'll say this, Nunez Roaches is the other defensive tackle. I think that Elijah Chapman, who's a rookie, number 94 is a better player right now than Nunez Roaches. So, 94, 97 inside. These, how the Cowboys block with Smith, how they block with Martin, how they block with BB, they need to try and control the middle of this defense the best they can. They're going to be some issues, probably on the outside, on the edges. Hopefully your backs can help you with that. Maybe your tight ends can help you with some stuff, but they've gotta make sure that they control the front of this pocket if they can't, because they can take advantage of this giant secondary if they can get the ball off. That's going to be the key in this, but running the football on these guys, it could be a little bit difficult, just because of, if you're gonna try and run it on the interior, Lawrence just can just rec shop that way. Burns, Thibodeau, kind of get up the field. Maybe you can get inside of them and have some ability. So, I think it's gonna be, if you're gonna try and run the ball, it needs to be a little bit more on the edges than it does inside, because these guys are gonna be problematic with having to block that, that Dexter Lawrence. I mean, if you wanna get the good out of Terence Still, you gotta get this run game going, 'cause he's turning into it. Now, what do you think about his matchup? Could this be an exposed weekend again for Steel? - It's gonna be very tough, because Thibodeau will be to his side, or Burns will be to his side, as I mentioned. And what these guys do is they have the ability to break you down, and if they know that they could take you inside on the rush, I think that's where, this is where, you know, everybody's gotta know that in the league right now, right? - Well, we talked about yesterday about what the giants and Andrew Thomas, and the problems he has, he sets wide inside rush, set wide inside rush, and that's how you attack guys like that, and what Steel is shown is that you could go over the top of him and get to the quarterback. I mean, anything inside, anything wide, he's pretty good at just keeping you wide, and making sure that Dak has that ability to step up, but it's the inside pressure, and if Burns and Thibodeau both are watching tape, and no, 'cause you saw him give up a couple of sacks, week one, week two, those inside pressure is a problem, and I guarantee you're gonna see that from these two guys against him. - We're gonna get open this week though. Guys are gonna be open down. - You got a shot to get open, like I say, I think that Banks will play a little bit more physical. I'll be interested to see how McLeod plays you coming off the knee injury, but if somehow this turns into that flock is in that mix, wherever he's lined up, that's where the ball needs to go. I mean, just if you get, if somehow he is in the slot, we'll see how they play around Drew Phillips being out of this game, but that's a big, big loss for them. - You got anybody from Fergie? - Well, they're gonna try, I think what they're gonna try and do is you've got, Pentec is gonna try and blitz, Tyler Neuben is a rookie, it was a second year player out of Minnesota, he's got some physicality, the way that he plays. He's got some size to him, he's about six, one and a half. He's, I've seen him cover pretty well, I've seen him play at depth at Minnesota, I've seen him do some things where the ball comes underneath, he does a really good job of driving on it. You guys remember, and I don't know how much they might use, you remember Isaiah Simmons, it was a first round pick on the Arizona Clemson, and he was, they didn't know if he was gonna play safety or he's gonna play linebacker. - I don't think they do, I still don't think they know. - They still don't know. - I wouldn't be surprised if Isaiah Simmons, number 19 gets some work there, but I have a feeling that Tyler Neuben, or they're gonna try and do something with one of these linebackers, maybe Micah McFadden, if he's not Blitzen, maybe they'll try and put a linebacker on Ferguson. But Ferguson's had some really good games against the Giants in the past. - Yeah, Ferguson and Lamb should be, should be cleaning up in a game like this. - You hope, if you could get them, everybody to hold up up front, and you know, and you don't give up any pressures especially through the middle of the pocket, there's some place to be made here. - Crusty's Corner brought you by Reliant Air Condition and gimmick-free AC Repair and Replacement. Thank you, Brian. - Thank you. - What's in store next chief? - We got a little college football hump day, dart-y new developments for the Broke Boys out west, and we start peeking ahead at Bama and Georgia next year in the nation. ♪ He's better over here ♪ - AT&T customers switching to T-Mobile has never been easier. We'll pay off your existing phone and give you a new one free, all on America's largest 5G network. Visit t-mobile.com/carrier-freedom to switch today. Pay off up to $650 via virtual prepaid master card in 15 days, free phone up to $830 via 24 monthly build credits plus tax, qualifying port and trade and service on Go 5G next to credit required. Contact us before canceling entire account to continue build credits to credit stop and balance and required finance agreements do. Post-season baseball is here and it is the absolute best time of the year. I'm Rod Bradford of Baseball's and Boring, and we're gonna have you covered every step of the way with instant reactions from players, and coaches, and managers, and fans, and reporters, and everybody else who is immersed in this awesomeness and all the craziness that comes with October baseball. So follow baseball as I'm Boring in the free Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts. (upbeat music)