ARLINGTON — When it came to rationalizing the shocking, franchise-rocking decision to trade star pass rusher Micah Parsons, Cowboys co-owner Stephen Jones offered an argument. No one, including the Joneses, would argue against Parsons being someone who could generate pressure on his own. The Joneses have even reiterated their belief in Parsons’ talent.
But pressure, Stephen Jones claimed hours after they traded Parsons, could be generated in another way, too.
“We felt like because of our depth on the edge, as well as the ability to scheme pressure, that we could make up for Micah,” Jones said.
As Sunday’s 34-17 loss to the Chargers highlighted — and as this entire season has shown — it turns out it’s not so easy.
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The Cowboys looked at Sunday’s game against the Chargers as an opportunity. Los Angeles entered the game allowing the second-most sacks in the NFL at an average of 3.6 per game. No quarterback in the NFL had been sacked more than Chargers quarterback Justin Herbert, who played less than three weeks after having surgery on his hand. The Chargers even lost starting left tackle Jamaree Salyer five plays into the game.
The Cowboys planned to take advantage. They came out blitzing and, unlike previous weeks, they didn’t change that approach. They came into the game blitzing an average of 25.2% of the time, according to Pro Football Reference. Against the Chargers, they rushed five or more pass rushers on 16 of Herbert’s 29 passing attempts.
How successful was the Cowboys’ biggest attempt at scheming pressure against one of the worst pass protections in the NFL? They finished with zero sacks, marking the first time Herbert wasn’t brought down all season.
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“I was disappointed, very disappointed today,” owner/general manager Jerry Jones said about the team’s inability to sack Herbert.
“It was pretty obvious on our evaluation of his past games that when you pressure him more, he has less production. So that was a shortcoming of us today. We couldn’t get pressure.”
The Cowboys tried in a variety of ways, too. They used the five-man front they’ve come to enjoy to rush the passer. They sent nickel corner Reddy Steward on surprise blitzes from his coverage spot. They’d sometimes line up two linebackers in the opposing A-gaps, right between the center and each guard, and either pass rush or bail into coverage, just as the Vikings did the previous week against a Cowboys offense that struggled to combat it.
All of it was rendered ineffective. Herbert, as his 42 rushing yards showed, is mobile and not easy to bring down. Cowboys coach Brian Schottenheimer alluded to that element after the loss. And yet, it’s something every other team in the league has overcome this year when facing the Chargers.
Jerry Jones said earlier this week, when reflecting on last week’s loss to the Vikings, how telling it was that struggling quarterbacks seem to have better games when playing the Cowboys. That may go for struggling offensive lines, too.
“We need to affect the passer,” Schottenheimer said about the Cowboys defense, which also had zero takeaways on Sunday. “Especially when you’re playing tight man to man and there’s guys running across the field, you got to affect him and make him make some off-target throws. And we didn’t do a very good job of that today.”
The Cowboys were without a big piece in defensive tackle Quinnen Williams, who was inactive after he was listed with a neck injury on Saturday in addition to the concussion he was recovering from after the Vikings game. He was missed on Sunday.
As the season has progressed, it’s been clear the Cowboys have missed an edge-rushing talent like they had in Parsons, too. Parsons tore his ACL in last week’s loss to the Denver Broncos. Despite that, he still had 12½ sacks on the year, which meant he had at least 12 sacks in every season during his five-year career thus far. He entered this week third in the NFL in pressures, according to Pro Football Focus, finishing the year with 79. The closest Cowboys player to Parsons entering the week was Osa Odighizuwa with 49.
The collective team numbers, from a sack standpoint, aren’t much better. The Cowboys have 28 sacks as a team this year. Through 16 games — the standard for an NFL season from 1978 through 2020 — only three teams in Cowboys franchise history had fewer sacks.
For perspective: The 1982 Cowboys had 32 sacks in only nine games of a strike-shortened season. The Cowboys also had Harvey Martin, Ed “Too Tall” Jones and Randy White on that team, among others.
Maybe players do matter when it comes to pass rush. As this season and Sunday have shown, maybe it’s not so easy to scheme pressure without it.
Jerry Jones was asked after the game if he looks back and thinks trading Parsons had more of a negative impact on the defense than he initially foresaw.
“I’d like to think that with where we are, I’m not so sure that one position, one player, would have had us in necessarily a different situation,” Jones said. “But that’s a fair look, as to: Would we have been maybe at a higher level?”
The evidence would indicate so.
Twitter/X: @JoeJHoyt
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Dallas returned to action Sunday after being eliminated from playoff contention.
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It was a somber day at AT&T Stadium even before kickoff, and the game didn’t make things any cheerier.
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