00:00We've got the Cowboys party with you all day long, and right now it's time for our Dallas Cowboys insider,
00:05Mickey Spagnola, brought to you by North Texas Ford Dealers. Ford is the best in Texas.
00:10And Specs, how about them savings from Specs? Proud partner of the Dallas Cowboys.
00:14Mickey, how are we doing today, man?
00:16I'm good. How about that Brad Shale?
00:19Yeah, that's nice, isn't it? That's a good feeling. I never get a win.
00:22I never get a win.
00:22That's pretty funny, the 25th anniversary. That's good. Or 20th, whatever it was.
00:28Mickey, what was the biggest takeaway for you from yesterday overall?
00:35A lot of people are like, hey, they still gave up 30 points.
00:38But I think the win itself and what the offense did in the fourth quarter is pretty big.
00:43Yeah, I think so.
00:45You know, and the weird thing is it just seems like at times the defense is coming around,
00:52and I know they gave up all those points once again.
00:58But, you know, at times, like, they held Houston to just three of ten third-down conversions.
01:07You saw Quinn Williams playing better.
01:10It was their first game since the opener to get sacks.
01:13They got two of them.
01:14And, you know, somehow kind of pressured Stroud,
01:17even though he threw for, what, 347 yards in the couple of touchdowns.
01:26So I guess maybe the key thing is they got stops when they, you know,
01:32sort of absolutely needed them until giving up the lead there with two minutes and 23 seconds to go.
01:40But, again, it's a team win.
01:43And what's that, the third time in four games, the offense has scored 30-something.
01:48And that second half was a pretty big explosion, scoring 28 points.
01:55Mickey, when you look at the way Brian Schottenheimer handled that second half
02:02and, more importantly, that fourth quarter, what stood out to you,
02:05and how impressed were you with how he handled it this time around versus a week ago?
02:10Yeah, I think that they were certainly more aggressive.
02:15I don't think they backed down.
02:18They found stuff that works, like throwing the ball to C.D. Lamb.
02:23And I thought it was, you know, a nice mix that they did stay aggressive.
02:29They weren't playing for a field goal to tie the game up.
02:34Their intent was to score a touchdown.
02:38And I think that's the way you've got to play.
02:41If you guys remember, I think it was last Tuesday
02:45when you guys had Jerry Jones on the station.
02:49He said, we need to make more aggressive decisions.
02:53And I thought he did so.
02:55And I see where a lot of people want to criticize him
02:58for going for the field goal at the end of the half
03:02and then missing it and giving up a field goal.
03:07But he was being aggressive.
03:09And I thought that was the tone of how he handled this game from the start,
03:14that they were going to be aggressive.
03:16Although, I would rather see if you win the toss
03:19to go take the ball and go score
03:22instead of having the chance of being behind right off the bat
03:26with this defense.
03:28You know, Mickey, Dak made some big-time throws yesterday.
03:32He made some big-time throws yesterday.
03:33Obviously, the Lamb to Pickens.
03:35They're getting their return.
03:37What was the connection?
03:40What do you think made that turn with him and C.D. Lamb?
03:44Well, I think that they were just, you know,
03:48taking advantage of how Houston wanted to play defense.
03:52I can't believe after they must have seen what happened with Baltimore
03:57the week before when they thought they could just double-seat George Pickens
04:03and, you know, they can deal with C.D. Lamb.
04:06Well, Houston did the same thing.
04:08They did a cloud cover on Pickens and said,
04:13okay, we got a corner that can stop C.D. Lamb.
04:16Well, I wonder what they think 189 yards later in the winning touchdown.
04:21So I think that had a lot to do with, you know, how they handled it.
04:26You know, they weren't running the ball very well,
04:29and then when you fall behind by 10, you know, it's time to go.
04:33And they took advantage of what their strength was.
04:37And Dak, who, you know, they struggled in the first half.
04:41What did we talk about all week?
04:43How good the Texans' defense was.
04:45And they were until the Cowboys finally were able to get some quicker passes off,
04:53do a better job of blocking up front,
04:57keeping tight ends in to help out the offensive line.
05:01And then all of a sudden, there they go with scoring 28 points.
05:06You know, they went into this game.
05:11They had scored 51 second-half points, was the fifth most in the NFL.
05:17Well, with this 28, they got 79, and that's the most so far after four games.
05:24So they've done pretty well adapting in the second half of games.
05:31One guy that's been maligned throughout the first, I don't know, four weeks,
05:34three weeks anyway, has been our guy Nick Sorensen, the special teams coach.
05:40And I thought for all intents and purposes, I mean, look,
05:42your return game wasn't bad yesterday.
05:45I thought the coverage guys did a good job.
05:48Clearly there's something going on with the field goal blocks two weeks in a row
05:51for the first time in, what, almost 30-plus years or whatever it's been.
05:54Kind of where are we at right now with the special teams group?
05:58Well, you know, they were better until they gave up the 53-yard return, right?
06:05And then the second block in two weeks, guys missing their assignments
06:11or just getting plain beat.
06:14That can't happen.
06:16So, yes.
06:16And I thought from the beginning, since they were having trouble covering kickoffs,
06:22which they had trouble all last season, that's why they've got Aubrey working those
06:29dirty kickoffs to try to get the ball to hit, you know, inside the 20-yard line
06:35and the goal line with line drive kicks, hoping they're bouncing
06:41and guys will have trouble fielding the ball, which they have been these last two weeks.
06:47But, yeah, you can't have block kicks like that.
06:51Now, some of it could be, you know, on the coach, but last week the guy that blocked that field
06:59goal,
06:59well, caused the block, the guy on the outside, if you go back and look,
07:05it sure looked like he jumped out off sides.
07:08And I think Terrence Steele said, oh, I better grab that guy.
07:11And then nobody took the guy inside, the next guy.
07:15And then in this one, Broderick Thomas, Broderick Jones fell down right in front of Will Anderson,
07:23who came in unblocked.
07:25So I don't know that that scheme of blocking or guys not doing what they're supposed to do
07:31in those situations.
07:32But the one that bothered me along with the block was the fact that they gave up that long
07:39kickoff return that turned into points.
07:42Yeah, we'll hope that the fall-down part of it isn't in the scheme anymore.
07:45We'll look forward to that in the future.
07:47Mickey, Joey Porter Jr., what kind of effect do you feel like he had on this game
07:52and Christian Parker's play calling?
07:54Yeah, I don't know that it had a huge effect.
07:57He ended up playing 25 snaps.
08:00That was five more than I think they anticipated.
08:04But I thought that you didn't see him chasing a receiver that had already caught the ball, right?
08:12Right.
08:13So I think that going forward, you know, as Parker said on Thursday, he kind of nicknamed him an eraser.
08:23And that means his ability to play on that side of the field gives him the potential to use,
08:34I think he called it a plus one, like I could use a plus one somewhere else in the secondary,
08:40or I can use a plus one somewhere else on the defense.
08:44And I think they did that a little bit by keeping safety at times closer to the line of scrimmage
08:51to help maybe with the run game.
08:55So I think as they go along and he gets, you know, more game-ready to play,
09:02now it's going to be interesting.
09:03I was going to say, well, the next game.
09:05But he's got to recover now after not having played any football since last year until Sunday.
09:13How quickly can he recover and be ready to play again on Thursday?
09:19And then the other thing is, you know, to help out,
09:23they were hoping Savon Revel could give him a little bit more than what he was giving him.
09:29He only had seven snaps in the game.
09:32And I think he might have felt that he didn't have confidence with that ankle that he sprained on Sunday
09:41in Rio.
09:41So they kind of, you know, kind of patched it together.
09:46And, you know, how well when the quarterback was able to throw for 347 yards.
09:54But again, there's things to fix.
09:57But the good thing is it's easier to fix things after you win than after you lose.
10:02Mickey, just last thing from me, one thing, the tight end group,
10:06how are we feeling about them four weeks in?
10:09Jake, maybe not his best game as a Dallas Cowboy on Sunday, the fourth down catch notwithstanding.
10:16And then we're hearing that DeMarvin Overshone is tracking to play on Thursday.
10:21How do you think that mixes things up on the linebacking side?
10:25Yeah, I would be somewhat lukewarm about that since they're not going to even have a padded practice this week.
10:34And they'll really only have one somewhat full practice on Tuesday.
10:40You know, and when you're out a month like that and have not even, you know, gotten into practice,
10:47it might be, you know, we'll see.
10:52I think from the linebacker standpoint, you know, once again, I thought D Winters had one of his better games.
11:00And we see what Barham can do against the run.
11:06Now, it'll help the rotation.
11:07Maybe Overshone can help out on nickel and use his speed and versatility to help in coverage.
11:16So that one we'll see.
11:19As for, oh, what was the first part of the question?
11:23I'm sorry.
11:23Your thoughts on the tight end group, more specifically?
11:26Well, when your wide receiver catches 17 passes, the tight ends probably aren't going to get much play, right?
11:34No, it's certainly true.
11:35I mean, or it's because your tight ends aren't getting open that you've got to go to that guy 17
11:39times.
11:40It worked, though, didn't it?
11:42No, I mean, it did.
11:43I mean, I guess we're just giving Jake a pass, I guess, at this point.
11:46We're just, hey, as long as we can throw it to CeeDee Lamb 17 times a game,
11:50we don't need anything out of the tight end group.
11:51Well, watch what the tight ends are doing, too.
11:55They're doing a lot of chipping, right, to help with the protection for the tackles, right?
12:02So, yeah, you know, I don't know that I could get picky after scoring 30-something points in three of
12:12the four games.
12:14Mickey, the going for, you know, punching it in three times with Javante Williams near the goal line,
12:21and I was a big fan of the decisions.
12:24There were a couple times they still tried to be cute with it down there,
12:29but they were able to have some good running plays near the goal line.
12:33That was something that I thought I really liked seeing.
12:36Yeah, especially what was the one from eight yards, was it eight yards out?
12:40Yeah.
12:41That he punched in.
12:42I thought that was, there was some really good blocking there, and he read it well.
12:47Yeah.
12:48He only rushed for 62 yards, but, you know, of his carries, three of them ended up in the end
12:53zone.
12:54So, the fact that, you know, they were able to run the ball in, unlike they did not have confidence
13:05in Rio to do it
13:06after they had a couple possessions stoned, one on fourth down, one on second and third down,
13:15I think that that was an improvement there for what they can do at the goal line,
13:21and that's got to happen, right?
13:23You should be able to punch it in running the ball and not have to rely on back shoulders
13:29or fade throws to score touchdowns.
13:33Well, Schottenheimer said that they're used to this.
13:35They're the Dallas Cowboys.
13:36They get short weeks all the time, and I think that was a shot at the NFL scheduling,
13:40but even still, what does it look like this week as they turn around quickly for Thursday night?
13:46Yeah, they should take a shot at it, right?
13:49It's ridiculous that you, you know, show up mid-morning on Monday
13:54and not only have to play a road game, but a noon game, too,
13:58and then you've got to come back and play in four days.
14:02At least it's at home, but it's another night game.
14:06And, you know, then they'll have, what, ten days?
14:09And then they've got two night-away games at Green Bay on Sunday
14:13and at Philadelphia on a Monday.
14:17So if they can, I always said if they could survive this first seven-game stretch
14:22at four and three, I think you would probably like the results.
14:27We will see how things go then as we get going through the week.
14:30Mickey, thank you so much for your time today.
14:32We'll talk with you again tomorrow, good sir.
14:34Tomorrow, good sir.
14:35Okay, you guys have a good day.
14:36See you.
