Divisional Preview v. Dallas
Date: Sunday, 1/22
Time: 3:30PM PT
Location: Levi’s Stadium (Santa Clara, CA)
Opponent: Dallas Cowboys
Despite our offense driving up and down the field at will, Seattle Seattle-d their way to a one-point first-half lead in the wildcard round, doubling down on the ground and loading up with designer runs to minimize possessions and keep the game (in typical Seattle fashion) annoyingly close. But after entering the half celebrating like the Cleveland Cavaliers getting not-swept by the 2016 KD Warriors (“Cavs in eight”), the Seahawks—just like those Cavs—promptly folded under superior talent and coaching. Now we face the Cowboys.
But first, a few quick hits on our victory over Seattle:
From a simmer to a boil. Brock Purdy started a little off, missing some dudes and showing nerves a bit more than we’ve been accustomed to. But then, as he has done up until this point, he clicked into gear, and once that happened our offense was unstoppable. The 505 total yards and 41 points were both season-highs for our offense, and the 324 passing yards were our second-best output of the year.
Once again, Purdy showed that his deep ball may not be great (he missed a wide-open TD to Jennings early then barely fit the ball into Jennings on that third quarter toss), but the fact that he throws it opens things up for us offensively. And his ability to extend plays in the passing game let him find two wide open running backs for scores in the redzone.
Perhaps the most telling part of how this offense has evolved to its current state was in Shanahan’s fake pitch naked bootleg touchdown to Deebo, a call that faked out the entirety of the Seahawks defense and once again added credence to the idea that Shanahan—and this offense—are more willing and able than ever to be aggressive in putting feet on necks when they smell blood in the water.
Someone’s never watched Friday. Shit-talking is equal parts art and math equation. There are some guys who are easy targets because you believe you can get under their skin and throw off their game. You hope that the sweet nothings you whisper in their ear will make them fold into a fit of rage where they get out of rhythm, their play falters, and/or they make dumb mistakes. Doing that well is the art. Picking the time, the place, and the target is the math equation. Pick right and your opponent’s play suffers. But if you pick wrong…
Granted, twisting a recently sprained ankle post-play is a bit more than shit-talking. And doing that to the dude who just broke four tackles to secure a first down, has a highlight reel composed of plays that resemble a power running back, and is the emotional leader of an offense that’s just itching for a reason to break things open makes for some fuzzy math to say the least. There’s a reason someone like The Rock can walk down the street alone and not get mugged. It’s cause most people just aren’t that stupid.
It’s not a coincidence that Shanahan called five straight runs after the incident that caused Trent Williams—who ranks incredibly low on the “would want to start shit with in an alley” power rankings—to rush to the defense of his star receiver and start a team-wide skirmish in the process. Nor is it a coincidence that the Niners would rack up three straight touchdowns and scores on all four of their second-half possessions after that occurred. And it wasn’t a coincidence that—after Deebo started hunting down and chirping in the ears of defenders after every big Niners play then cemented the victory himself—Seattle’s only retort was to let out their feelings on a helpless yard marker.
the grounds crew wants a word
The eyes have it. Just weeks after erasing DK Metcalf in Seattle, Charvarius Ward wound up on the wrong end of a number of big plays to Seattle’s star receiver—the most obvious being the 50-yard go route that gave the Seahawks an early 14-13 lead.
It was all-in-all a forgettable game for Ward, but what stood out the most was that he was clearly keying back shoulder passes down the sideline. This got him tangled up and opening early and/or at the wrong angle on Metcalf’s vertical stems. And from there he was too out of position to makeup the ground. My guess would be that DK was using head or eye fakes—triggering the DB coaching point of turning for the ball when the receivers eyes look up for it—before continuing up the field. Based on what we’ve seen from Ward the majority of this season, the hope is that this is more of an aberration than a long-term issue.
On the plus side, Deommodore Lenoir had an excellent game after being picked on a bit over the past month. The second-year corner gave up two grabs for 16 yards, held Geno Smith to a 20.8 QB rating when targeted, and picked off a pass intended for Tyler Lockett. More deep balls are coming for both of these guys. But it was nice to see Lenoir with a strong outing as we move onto more explosive offenses.
Slim Charles. In a game where Bosa not only failed to register a sack but —for the first time in his career—failed to register a pressure, Omenihu came up big with two sacks and the red hand slap that forced the game’s first turnover and sent the Niners off to the races.
Omenihu, who we got from the Houston Garbage Fires for a sixth-rounder last year (and whose 98th percentile DE arm length would make even Trent Baalke blush) has quietly put together a nice pass-rushing season in year two under Kris Kocurek. After the Texans bulked him up to play more on the interior, the Niners asked him to slim back down and play an outside-in role on their defensive line. He obliged, shedding 15 pounds to get down to 265, and—despite a modest 4.5 sacks on the season—his 54 pressures rank 20th among all edge rushers.
This was Omenihu’s second career multi-sack game. The first? Last year’s wildcard win over the Cowboys, when he put up 1.5 sacks and forced another fumble.
And that’s what we call a segway!
trying to save the world from seeing this again
THE COWBOYS
Long a playoff laughing stock, the Dallas Cowboys are fresh off a 31-14 thumping of the Buccaneers, their first road playoff win in thirty years and just their fourth playoff win since 1996. Given an entire generation has been born and joined the workforce since the Cowboys were a true contender, it’s easy to poke fun at them (and, to be clear, I’m not saying you shouldn’t), but it’s worth remembering that the clean and tidy narratives that we give to players, coaches, and teams are often lazy shorthand for what’s really going on—the Sparknotes version of an actual accounting of the facts. And for all of us who “read” Shakespeare during school, we should know how reliable cursory skimming is versus the actual unabridged text.
Sports narratives are largely the result of an echo chamber of talking heads and mercenary bloggers turned “reporters.” Some of their takes are never true. While those that are true, only exist that way until they’re not. Jim Harbaugh can’t beat Ohio State… until he does so in back-to-back years in emphatic fashion. Phil Mickelson can’t win a major… until he wins three Masters in seven years. You can’t win championships with three-point shooting… until the entire NBA does exactly that. All this to say, feel free to laugh at the Cowboys, but don’t overlook them. Sports memes and five-second hot takes are far from predictive. This team is as talented as we are. And now that the playoff monkey is lifted off their back, we’ll need to bring our A-game to make sure last week wasn’t a stepping stone towards their ascension to the Super Bowl contender that they’ve long been thought to be.
OFFENSE
DVOA: 15th
Pass: 13th
Run: 10th
All offenses operate somewhere on the spectrum of (1) building an attack around an identity and (2) being multiple to keep defenses off-guard. Regardless of the direction a team leans, it can have success if the execution and the details of its choice are on point.
Imagine a graph (that I was too lazy to make) with offensive efficacy on the x-axis (horizontal) and offensive identity on the y-axis (vertical). A team like the Niners or the Eagles—with potent offenses stemming from clear identities—would be in the upper right quadrant. A team like the Ravens would be even higher on the identity scale but would skew left with decreased offensive success (depending on if we include Lamar Jackson in their performances, it would skew A LOT left). A team like the Chiefs would be in the lower right quadrant. Super effective and very multiple in their attack. A team like the Raiders would be a little less multiple and a decent chunk less effective. And a team like the Chargers would reside in the bottom left. No identity and—given the talent at their disposal—little offensive efficacy.
Teams in the upper right quadrant—like us—build their playbooks around what they want to do (in our case, run the ball and generate YAC yards in the passing game) and then layer in lots of misdirection, window dressing, and counter punches to keep defenses honest. When an offense built that way struggles, it’s often because those counter punches aren’t varied and/or effective enough to keep their bread-and-butter offensive identity viable against the opposing defense that’s keying it.
Conversely, when a team in the lower right quadrant—like the Chiefs—struggles on offense, its often because their wide array of plays isn’t working, and—since they’ve gone wide instead of focused in their offensive approach—they either aren’t practiced enough in their many concepts and/or lack the ability to lean back on the bread-and-butter “staples” that a team with high identity has more readily available.
The Cowboys very much fall into that latter camp. And while their offense isn’t as highly touted as in the past, that’s largely due to Dak’s early-season injury and consistency issues. When they’re on, they’re as explosive as any team in football, as evidenced by the 35.5 points per game that they’ve scored against opponents who made the playoffs since Dak returned from injury mid-season.
The greatest constants this Dallas offense has schematically are that they want to stay balanced, they want to set up the run, and they want to use those two things to get Dak into rhythm as quickly as possible so that they can hum on all cylinders.
Same backs, different roles. 2022 officially marks the last year that Ezekiel Elliott will be drafted ahead of Tony Pollard in fantasy leagues, as the latter clearly emerged as the Cowboys’ top back this season. With his speed and ability in the run and pass game, Pollard’s become one of the most dangerous big-play threats in the league, and the Cowboys do a great job of being creative in getting him the ball in multiple ways. If there’s any way in which the Cowboys have definitely improved this season on offense, it’s largely due to their increased utilization of Pollard. He’s measured out as the more efficient and dangerous of the two Dallas runningbacks for quite some time, but 2022 was when the coaching staff finally was willing to accept that.
Throughout the regular season, Dallas was careful in keeping Pollard’s total touches and hits down, but now that we’re into the playoffs he should be more of the lead back than ever. But don’t sleep on Zeke Elliott. The Cowboys like to deploy both of them at once and the elder statesman still led the team in carries and rushing touchdowns. He’ll be used heavily whenever the Cowboys are looking for less of a chef’s knife and more of a meat tenderizer.
Shuffleboard. Part of the inconsistency of the Cowboys’ offense has come with the decreasing health and increasing permutations of their offensive line. A torn ACL to starting LT Terrence Steele caused a late-season shakeup that—in addition to C Tyler Biadasz going down with an ankle injury in week 17—has left the Cowboys scrambling to reassemble what has long been a strength of this team.
In the wildcard game against Tampa Bay, Dallas made the bold move of trotting out a starting OL arrangement that they hadn’t used all season. This was due in part to necessity but also to accommodate the healthy return of Biadasz. The resulting lineup of (from left to right) Jason Peters—Tyler Smith—Biadasz—Zack Martin—Tyron Smith proved formidable on Monday, limiting the Bucs to only one sack early in the first quarter, and the decision to move former LG Connor McGovern—their OL’s biggest weakness—to an auxiliary sixth lineman role—where he can play jumbo fullback/wingback and kick out linebackers and defensive ends—has paid early dividends.
From the one-game sample size, the Cowboys’ sporadic offensive line issues seem to have been solved, but the Niners’ front seven is a whole different beast than Tampa Bay’s.
The Housewives are on the field! This AT&T commercial may be the best of their “hybrid sports viewing” ads, but—if we’re being honest—it’s mid at best. Advertisement quality notwithstanding, the idea of keeping Prescott uncomfortable to stymy the Dallas offense is a legitimate one.
Dak has a tendency to start games slowly, with his accuracy a little off, balls sailing high, and his reads a tad fuzzy (0-4 with one sack against the Bucs on Monday). But once he figures out what the defense is doing and gets going he can heat up in a hurry (25-of-29 for 305 yards and 4 TDs the rest of the way), and when Dak is playing like a Tier 1 quarterback, this offense is operating like a Tier 1 offense.
In order to get Dak into rhythm the Cowboys like to start with heavy doses of the running game and by utilizing motions, various formations, and delayed TE releases to generate a bunch of easy bootleg passes to the flat. It sometimes makes for a slow build-up offensively, but the return is well worth the investment.
Dak is an interesting case because he seems like a solid dude, a well-liked leader, and a good NFL quarterback. But the lack of team playoff success, the spotlight that is constantly put on Dallas quarterbacks by the media and ownership alike, and the never-ending debate about whether or not he is a “great” quarterback have probably—at least to some degree—contributed to a season that’s been largely out of character.
Dak has historically protected the ball well, made smart decisions, and put up the occasional monster stat line, but the knock has always been that he hasn’t made enough big-time throws to elevate his team when the stakes are highest. I have to believe that—in conjunction with some injury rust—this narrative has played some part in a season that saw Dak—despite playing in only 12 games—lead the league in interceptions, lose 2+% off his completion percentage, and set career-highs in picks and lows in YPA and passing TDs during the three-year Kellen Moore era.
In short, he’s pushing the issue too much, trying to fit the ball into tighter spots than he should, and taking more risks than needed. Granted, these issues aren’t all the time. Dak has put up plenty of good tape this season. But until last weekend against the Bucs, he'd thrown a pick in seven straight games. The Cowboys know that in order to get the best out of Dak they need to establish the running game off the jump, stay balanced in their attack, and give him a few lay-ups early so that the doesn’t feel the need to push and play hero ball as the game goes on.
DEFENSIVE KEYS
The Last Time… In our 2021 wildcard matchup with the Cowboys, our defensive line basically feasted, sacking Dak five times and hitting him 14 times while our defense held the Boys to 77 yards rushing on 21 attempts (w/ 27 of those yards coming from Dak himself). While Dallas would put up 17 points and make things interesting late, their scoring drives were largely the result of Josh Norman being the only dude in the building not expecting a fake punt and a Jimmy G being returned to our 28-yard line.
The Lamb Plan. CeeDee Lamb ascended to the Cowboys’ No.1 receiver role last year and rightfully so. But the off-season jettisoning and then weird shit-talking of fellow starting wideout Amari Cooper left a massive hole opposite Lamb. Michael Gallup is that No.2 wideout, but while Gallup can run and make the occasional splash play, the drop-off from Lamb is steep.
How the Niners guard Lamb will be a major factor in how they do in pass coverage on Sunday. We’ve seen Charvarius Ward shadow a top wideout like DK Metcalf, but the Cowboys are aware of their wide receiver room and do a much better job of moving CeeDee into the slot and putting him in motion to avoid shadow corners. Also, as one of the most zone-heavy defenses in the league, there’s only so much true shadowing we can do while still adhering to the principles that make our defense elite.
Regardless, Lamb is a genuine three-level threat at wideout who can both run after the catch and high point the ball down the field, and allowing him to go off is the easiest way to ensure Dak is comfortable all game.
Test the new blood. Surprise, surprise, if we dominate the LOS the way our defense has been assembled to do, this offense will have tough sledding this weekend. The Cowboys employ one of the best guards in the league and two tackles with a shot at Canton once they retire, but those tackles are getting long in the tooth and we applied plenty of pressure last year against a more established starting five. There are bound to be hiccups in communication with players shuffling to different positions and the stunts and slants that we are so adept at along our DL—along with the mug looks and simulated pressures we like to employ on passing downs—will be an excellent test to see how solidified this Dallas front really is.
That applies to the Dallas tight ends as well. They have two guys with good athleticism who can both run and catch the ball, but neither are exceptional blockers. Dalton Schultz is often the barometer for their offensive success and their safety blanket as their No.2 option in the passing game. If we force him into pass pro to account for heat from our DL, that’s an absolute win for us. I’d expect to see Bosa get a lot of chip blocks and delayed releases, with the Cowboys trying to get the best of both worlds (slowing down Bosa and getting a quick outlet to the flat). Some of those will be unavoidable, but slants and stunts can help in the matter—particularly on passing downs.
In the run game, it’s more of the same. While our run defense is one of the best in the league, teams have had some success pounding the ball for short gains if they can stick to it and show enough different looks. Save for Javon Kinlaw—who is only now getting his sea legs after being out with injury—we’re a relatively small front seven on top of being a wide 9, so we’re only okay on short-yardage runs and generating tackles for loss. Where we excel—and are best in the league—is in using our team speed to limit runs of 5-10 yards and 10+ yards. The Boys like to run out of double-tight sets. If we pound them on the edges and force them into more 11 personnel, they lose a big chunk of their play-action game and may have to abandon the looks that let them run the ball inside.
Show don’t tell. Dak is an elite-level pre-snap player. He’s great at diagnosing what defenses are presenting and checking into plays that attack the defense’s weaknesses. But he sometimes gets caught up in his pre-snap read, and that can get him into trouble. Hiding coverages and rotating safeties late—although not too late, as they like to run tempo—will be important.
I expect teams to attack our defense by trying to throw over us in the secondary and over our linebackers on deep crossers (or outside alley shots) off of play action. If we can stay disciplined with our eyes and eliminate those big plays outside, then we should be at an advantage inside the hashes. While the Cowboys are certain to try and scheme up some shot plays and one-on-one matchups between Lamb and one of our safeties out of the slot—our rangy linebackers mean there’s little room for error in the middle of the field. This is doubly the case against Prescott, who has struggled with picks across the middle of the field throughout his career.
As stated in last year’s write-up, Prescott has thrown 18 of his 25 picks prior to this season across the intermediate and deep middle zones of the defense. While I don’t know how many of his 15 picks this season were between the hashes (thanks for nothing Gamepass), I know both of his interceptions against the Packers were late throws taken away by DBs jumping routes. In this game in particular, those hidden coverages could result in valuable takeaways.
Make them break tendencies. Despite their weaponry and the various route combinations and gadget plays they draw up, the Cowboys were torpedoed in last year’s playoffs in part because the Niners heavily keyed their formational and situational tendencies. I don’t know if those tendencies still exist to that level, but if they do, you’d better believe the Niners are aware of them.
Our two worst defensive performances this season were against offenses with multiple attacks who employed misdirection well enough to generate shot plays and neuter the aggression and speed that feeds our defense. But in order to do that successfully, you need to regularly break tendencies. Otherwise, all your effort to scheme up a wider array of plays is done under by the fact that the opposition is expecting them.
let’s avoid this
DEFENSE
DVOA: 2nd
Weighted: 6th
Run: 5th
Pass: 3rd
Cowboys DC Dan Quinn is a hot head coaching candidate for a few reasons: (1) he’s done the job before, and some teams (see: Broncos) remain shell-shocked from their recent whiffs on inexperienced HCs; (2) he quickly turned a bottom-of-the-league Cowboys defense into one of the best units in football; and (3) he sustained that success while continuing to change and evolve the scheme in his second year in Dallas.
Once synonymous with the 4-3 Under Cover 3 system that he created alongside Pete Carroll (and that gave berth to the Legion of Boom and the golden era of Seahawks football), Quinn’s defenses in Dallas have been much more variable in their approach.
At its core, the Cowboys’ defense wants to cycle a deep crop of defensive linemen into mostly four-man fronts, leaning more on stunts—which they run at one of the highest rates in the league—than blitzes to generate a top-five pressure and hurry rate while playing a well-balanced mix of Cover 1, 2, and 3 on the back end. They are very much a penetrating one-gap scheme that is aggressive up and down the field, and they’ve pushed aside mass cynicism from the analytics community—who felt their ability to generate turnovers would regress to the mean this year—to lead the league in takeaways for the second straight season—a feat that hasn’t been accomplished in at least twenty years.
The Cowboys are better known for their offense, but their defense is the more consistent group, and it’s only getting better. While Dallas has been diced up a few times over the past months by the Jags and the Hurts-less Eagles, they have since returned two key contributors—340-pound defensive tackle Jonathan Hankins and starting mike linebacker Leighton Vander Esch—and their performance against the Bucs should be a more accurate indicator of their ability than the four weeks before it.
The man in the mirror. On paper, the Cowboys’ use of four-man fronts, heavy DL rotation, a general reliance more on stunts than blitzes to generate high amounts of pressure, and variable coverages on the back-end sounds familiar. Because that’s what our defense does. But there are a couple of key differences.
Our coverage preferences lean heavily towards zone, and—all else being equal—we’re most likely to sit in Cover 3 and Cover 4 and rally up to the ball. While it’s impossible to get inside Dan Quinn’s head, I think he would like his coverages to skew more aggressively toward pressing wideouts and jumping routes.
Against the Bucs, they did exactly what I would have (and what I think they’d like to do in any given week if the matchups allowed it). They sat in Cover 2 and man, were physical at the LOS to mess up route timing, and dared anyone on that Tampa Bay offense to beat them with speed. Unafraid of the Bucs’ nonexistent run game, they were totally fine deploying two-high safeties on early downs because they know how hard it is to throw the short game (Brady’s favorite) into those Cover 2 windows, and they knew the Bucs couldn’t throw the ball deep given the pressure up front.
Cover 1 and Cover 2 need to be paired with a strong pass rush because they’re both susceptible to multiple long-developing routes down the field, but Dallas believes their pass rush can consistently get home (which it largely has) before those deep crossers or multiple verticals can spring open. Additionally, the ability to oscillate between Cover 3 and Cover 2 looks means the Cowboys can show a soft corner pre-snap and then sneak that man down into the flats to jump balls and create turnovers. Given this defense is very much built off of a strong pass rush and turnover-hunting, those coverage combinations make a ton of sense.
Conversely, we’re more of a Cover 3 and Cover 4 team because of the incredible range that our linebackers have in coverage. When the underneath run defenders can get the depth that our guys can, we can play a bigger shell over the top, force shorter passes, and fly to the football for minimal gains after the catch. This is a more conservative coverage approach that allows our safeties—who are not known for their pure speed—to have extra support deep so that they’re less likely to get picked on down the field in 1-on-1 matchups.
Dudes at DE. This Dallas defense is powered by its deep rotation of pass rushers and supercharged by the NFL’s #1 defensive freak, Micah Parsons. Nick Bosa’s greatest competitor for the DPOTY award is an absolute monster of an athlete and—in his second year in the league—Quinn has moved him more and more toward the LOS. Last year Parsons played off-ball linebacker about 60% of the time and the rest at defensive end. Now, he’s about 80% along the DL and 20% off-ball. Much of that is matchup dependent and—with Parsons playing five or fewer off-ball snaps in 10 of 18 games—there are some weeks where Parsons basically only plays along the D-line. It makes sense, given Parsons is at his best and most disruptive laser beaming toward quarterbacks with his 4.3 speed.
Opposite Parsons, don’t sleep on DeMarcus Lawrence—whose counting stats aren’t as impressive as in past years but who is still plenty disruptive. He’s the lead dog of the rest of the defensive line, which includes five dudes (four of them defensive ends) with over 23 pressures on the season. For any fans of PFF ratings, they have six dudes on the DL whose pass rush grades rate in the green (for good), and they use all of them in a healthy rotation.
Despite Tampa Bay having a top-three Pass Blocking Efficiency (PBE) rating (an ESPN metric given to OLs for how frequently they can block the pass rush for 2.5 seconds), the Cowboys absolutely harassed Brady all night. This is what Trent Williams and the boys will be up against.
LVE FTW. Mike linebacker Leighton Vander Esch has had an interesting career, going from ascending superstar as a rookie to injury-prone and largely-lost replacement level player through various schemes, before cementing himself this year as the unquestioned leader of the Dallas linebacker corps. LVE’s emergence (or re-emergence) likely has played a part in Quinn’s comfort level sliding Parsons down to DE more often, and when LVE missed the last month of the season, he left a sizable hole.
When Parsons is on the DL, Anthony Barr typically is his replacement at weak-side backer. When LVE went down and Barr had to man their linebacker corps solo the results were… not great. Excluding the week 17 game against the Josh Dobbs-led, Derrick Henry-less Titans and the week 18 matchup against a Commanders team where half the team didn’t dress and the other half played like they didn’t dress—the LVE-less Cowboys got gashed for 40 points and 503 yards by the Jags and 34 points and 442 yards by the Gardner Minshew Eagles. While the defense still generated a whopping 7 takeaways in those games, they lose a lot of their fundamental drive-stopping ability without LVE.
Realistically, the depth the Cowboys have at linebacker is opposite what they have along the defensive line. They just don’t have anyone with the range and recognition skills to do what LVE does, and that’s part of why they lean so heavily on extra DB personnel sets and have safety Jayron Kearse regularly moonlight as an extra LB.
Moar Shuffleboard. While cornerback Trevon Diggs’ otherworldly interception numbers from last year have regressed to the mean, he’s put together a more well-rounded 2022. Diggs still has great ball skills (three picks, 14 pass deflections this year) and will still gamble at times, but he’s no longer the dude with the binary outcome of “generate a turnover” or “get roasted.”
Granted, there’s been less of a reason to hard target Diggs this year given the dire situation opposite him. Anthony Brown started the season as the Boys’ second outside corner, and—while he wasn’t exactly killing it—his replacements have been getting dunked on with regularity. Kelvin Joseph came in and got roasted by the Texans and the Jags. Nahshon Wright replaced him then gave up 157 yards in completions to receivers catching balls from Josh Dobbs and Sam Howell. Trayvon Mullen got a shot to close the year and promptly gave up two grabs for 58 yards before getting hurt.
So for the wildcard round, the Boys decided to approach things differently. Just as the Cowboys offense pulled OL weak-link Connor McGovern and put him into a support role as they attempted to play their best five linemen forward regardless of position, the Dallas defense shifted rookie DaRon Bland—who has had a strong first season playing almost entirely in the slot—to the outside corner opposite Diggs. Bland was peppered with targets and wasn’t a lockdown presence by any means, but the defense had one of its best performances in months.
OFFENSIVE KEYS
Last time… the Cowboys opened up with Cover 3, were promptly torched by a balanced attack as we ran the ball and hit the alleys in the quick game, and then promptly moved to an aggressive Cover 1 for much of the day. That led to a few tough third-down completions, then—once Jimmy got banged up—an airmailed long incomplete to Aiyuk, the pick, and a more conservative approach from there on out.
Stay on the sticks. As always, keeping our offense balanced and on schedule will be key to keeping us operating at a high level. Against the best pass rush we’ve faced all year, that will require some extra effort. This is a great litmus test for our revamped interior offensive line as well as Mike McGlinchey—who has settled into a solid season at RT—but also for our rookie quarterback.
While Brock Purdy’s ability to extend plays has greatly increased the ceiling of our offense, he’ll need to be careful about scrambling into trouble against this team and—in particular—the edge duo of Parsons and Lawrence. Purdy has a tendency to flush outside the pocket when pressure comes—rather than step into it—and it will be considerably harder for him to turn back shoulder and get outside of the athletes that Dallas employs on their edges. In this matchup, every time Purdy chooses to lose ground and bounce outside rather than stay in the pocket and keep his eyes downfield, the cost-benefit analysis will be calculated in a way that he hasn’t yet seen in the NFL.
While Purdy has been up to the task since taking over the starting gig, he’s done so largely against average-to-below-average defenses. The Bucs were a bit banged up when he faced them in his inaugural start. While against the Commanders— a top 10 unit—our offense was greatly aided by Taylor Heinecke, and we settled for far too many field goals. This Dallas defense—now at full strength—is unquestionably the best defense Purdy has seen in his young NFL career.
That Hangover meme. It’ll be interesting to see how Dallas mixes up their coverages against us this time around. We’re clearly adept at attacking Cover 3—as much of our passing attack thrives on putting alley defenders in binds versus the run and pass—but it’s hard to show two-high against us and stop the run with any consistency.
Cover 1 clearly worked the best against us last time as it not only gives numbers in the box but also lets a linebacker or the occasional safety sit in the hole as a rat defender and try to jump the underneath routes that we love so dearly. But that game plan is tougher to implement in 2022. Aiyuk is a year better and has excelled against man coverage, CMC is now on the roster and is a matchup nightmare one-on-one, and the presence of McCaffrey and a healthy Elijah Mitchell means Deebo now moonlights as a back—by choice, rather than necessity. We’re just much more capable than we were last year at mixing and matching personnel and offensive looks to find matchups that we like.
Perhaps Dallas tries to stick mostly to man but hide it more pre-snap, hoping to confuse our rookie quarterback. Or maybe they sprinkle in more Cover 2 to clog the underneath passing lanes and tell their safeties to fill hard against the run—deep ball be damned—as a way of daring us to throw it down the field with any consistency. That doesn’t seem fundamentally sound to me, but people have done crazier things against Niners offenses. Whatever Dallas does, I can’t imagine they’ll be able to keep things simple against us.
Seconds plz. Regardless of what coverages Dallas deploys it will be worth targeting second linebackers and second cornerbacks in the passing game. This Cowboys defense is well-coached and talented, but they’re lacking in depth. DaRon Bland has had a promising rookie season in the slot, but he is largely unproven outside. While the Bucs threw the ball 66 times last week, Bland still gave up nearly 100 yards receiving. Guarding Aiyuk down the field while tackling Deebo on underneath routes will be quite the task. If the Boys stick to last week’s lineup then will Jayron Kearse—who has played mostly box safety and bonus linebacker—be able to cover our guys in space in the slot? The same question could be asked of Israel Mukuamu, who was mostly a backup safety this year but played a season-high snaps as Dallas’ dimeback against the Bucs.
Likewise, at linebacker, Anthony Barr has never been a stellar coverage guy. When Parsons slides down to defensive end—which could be the large majority of the game—can we make Barr chase CMC out of the backfield while trying to drop deep enough to stop Kittle on digs and crossers? LVE is a talented linebacker, but if he doesn’t have any coverage support from his fellow LBs, how much ground can he really cover?
There are matchups to be had, and much of our success in the passing game—past the line of scrimmage at least—could be determined by how well Shanahan’s multi-tool of death matches up against the Cowboys’ linebackers and their menagerie of safeties.
The Shanny Special. Despite the return of a healthy LVE and Johnathan Hankins, I think we can run on this team as long as we stay diverse in our schemes. Against a defense as aggressive as this one—which likes to shoot gaps and get upfield to create havoc—all those little Shanahan wrinkles and misdirections could pay dividends.
Fly motions that freeze backside pursuit and force the linebackers to shift over just a hair right before we snap the ball, split zone looks that give cross-flow backfield action, weave back tosses and faux pulling guards—anything that freezes the flow of the linebackers for just a split-second could pay dividends against this team because that could not only lead to missed assignments but may prevent them from playing as aggressively as they want to. I think that if we can take away the confidence and speed of their reads, we can out-physical them in the box.
When running outside, I think we can get the edge against this team with pitches and condensed formations, and I’d expect a heavy dose of motion across field and crack blocks to create closed or faux-closed formations that make their corners have to take on the point-of-attack run game responsibilities that often fall on safeties and linebackers. I don’t know if these Dallas corners can hold up as tacklers if put in that position on enough tosses and powers.
Speaking of powers, gap runs should be a healthy part of our run game in this matchup, both because they are a natural complement to our zone runs and because they can punish teams for big gains when they shoot upfield or stunt too aggressively. At full health, this Cowboys defense has been stout against the run—I don’t want to make it seem like it will be easy sledding on the ground—but when you can get push off the line they’ve struggled to tackle on the second level. The Boys have allowed the fourth-most runs of 10+ yards this year, and—despite our newfound quest for offensive balance—gashing teams for big gains on the ground is quite literally the first foundational tenet of Shanahan’s offense.
SUMMARY
There are a number of different ways to look at this Cowboys team. You can say they’re products of variance and that they aren’t fundamentally better than the temperamental squad we saw slap-dick through narrow wins over the Texans and listless Titans. Or you can say they’re an early-season juggernaut—who has won or been in every single game—and who is just now getting healthy and playing their best ball of the season. Perhaps last week’s performance was a monkey off their back that will allow this team to finally live up to its potential. Or perhaps it was an aberration against a horrid Bucs team, and they’ll lay their playoff egg in this round rather than the last.
In some ways, this game will seem like a litmus test of what’s more legit: the Cowboys as a genuine contender—envigorated after shedding years of playoff baggage—or Brock Purdy as a QB who can contend for a Super Bowl despite his age and limited tools. While many expect one or the other to turn into a pumpkin at any given moment, that doesn’t need to be the case. And although the talking heads will almost certainly peg the results of this game as a statement of fact against the legitimacy of the Cowboys, Brock Purdy, or whatever draws the SEO clicks, there’s very much a world where this game is—like so many other football games—a matchup of two good teams that comes down to a few key moments and lucky bounces.
I don’t know which Cowboys team we’ll see on Sunday, but I know that at their best, Dallas is one of the top teams in football and a difficult out. Luckily, so are we.
Go Niners 👍🏈