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00:12our dallas cowboys insider and man who is worried about the white socks game today
00:17it is mickey spagnola good morning sir i've got my hat and my favorite shirt ready to go
00:24okay all right do you how long have you had that hat good question uh the hat was a souvenir
00:33from
00:34the 2005 world series victory that's a good hat right there okay nice hat and i've got i've got
00:42some that have shrunk with three different logos starting probably from mid uh to late 60s to
00:53the 70s for sure that's cool that's pretty cool wow okay throw away anything right
01:01or at least my mother didn't kept them in a box for me there you go that's nice now we
01:08will obviously
01:09been be watching and rooting for your team this evening but i wanted to focus on the cowboys for
01:16now we can have our hopefully alcs party tomorrow what do you think that this team can do to get
01:24out to a quicker offensive start because i know in the second half they're unbelievable 79 second
01:30half points scored first half only 43 and it goes 7 17 13 and 6 they have gotten off to
01:39significantly
01:40slower offensive starts in the first half anything behind that and anything that you would like to
01:46see changed for that well first of all if i win the toss i want the ball okay because the
01:55cowboys
01:56have gotten away from that i know and i've got an offense that uh is tied for second in the
02:03league
02:03with points scored only one uh behind buffalo right i want the ball and and you know to this point
02:15you fear the defense well why put them out there and fall behind seven to nothing
02:21so to me we can start right there they're trying they're trying to get that 14 point swing at
02:28halftime that's what that's what the goal is it just has it doesn't happen every time they're after
02:34their their uh four game uh record for scoring points in the second half right i mean maybe so the
02:42only
02:42the only team that has more in cowboys history was in 2007 they had 101 i believe it was wow
02:50so
02:51how about that i did not know that so anyway uh and and maybe just instead of feeling teams out
03:02start more aggressively saying this is what we do we're gonna do it right uh because i feel like
03:10there's a feeling out period and maybe you know it's somewhat necessary to see how teams come out
03:17and play defensively because i think some teams and you know it's early in the season you're judging off
03:23of a lot of what they did the previous season and i think teams have changed up on how they
03:30uh you know
03:31going to play defense against you uh i i don't think the cowboys uh assumed uh or you know perceive
03:41that teams would come out and say okay we're taking away uh george pickens and we'll deal with cd lamb
03:50right well if they look at the stats he's leading the league in receptions he's leading the league in
03:58receiving yards and he's third in receiving touchdowns you you you want to still go in man
04:06to man against them go right ahead then yeah right and i and i don't know that it takes a
04:12while to
04:13figure out what teams are doing uh with kind of cloud coverage on pickens and then thinking they've
04:19got a corner that can deal with cd by himself uh so um you know maybe you just assume that's
04:28what
04:28this team's going to do and then adjust but uh i would imagine at some point teams are going to
04:34change
04:34what they're trying to do since and i know look it's a four game uh a sample right but i
04:42factored
04:43out his numbers uh over 17 games that he's on now he's on a pace to set single season records
04:51for
04:51receptions and receiving yards heck yeah i hope he does it me based on my couch he plays right oh
05:00okay
05:00as we were talking about yesterday on our our podcast the everson walls was kind of uh explaining
05:07how he would defend the cowboys passing game and someone said well hopefully todd bowles is not
05:14listening to us right yeah well and he might should be listening to us now that's the that's the thing
05:21about todd bowles and what he does like usually in his secondary he's going to be he's going to be
05:26very zone heavy and he's going to get trying to get pressure you know with his guys up front so
05:30i'm
05:31kind of curious because he likes to be zoned on both sides so i'm interested to see how dac attacks
05:37that and you know figures out because every once in a while he'll go single high and dac will eat
05:42you up whenever you go single high but i'm just very interested to see how he uh he attacks the
05:46the shell coverage with that tampa usually plays with and i i would imagine the cowboys are bracing for
05:53a lot of pressure a lot of blitzing right because in in my mind and i probably told you guys
06:00this before
06:00that the way to control wide receivers is to control the quarterback go get them
06:06make them uncomfortable put pressure on them uh and that'll make the secondary coverage a lot
06:13easier uh if you can do that and do it successfully well let me ask you this then when do
06:20you flip it
06:21to the other side of the ball would you like to see okay see the cowboys implement a similar strategy
06:30yes absolutely uh and i think they've got some people capable of doing that right yes especially
06:37caleb downs i think he's good at it the few times they have sent him in there and it and
06:43it really
06:43hasn't matter if he's blitzing run or if he's blitzing uh the quarterback uh in a passing situation
06:50because i think he's athletic enough and has enough uh perception of what's taking place to be
06:59successful doing that uh so we'll see if going forward they decide look we've got a rookie undrafted
07:07quarterback back there running the show do not do not allow him to get comfortable in the pocket in his
07:15second nfl start i'm not sure i'm not sure that uh that the fans are ever going to stop talking
07:25about
07:25terrence steel until terrence steel just says you know hey guys until he's like one-on-one perfect
07:31every time but for the cowboys it seems like they're like look he's this is what we're going to run
07:37with
07:37out there and we're just going to have to make do with is that kind of the feeling on that
07:41and
07:42sometimes we'll have to rely on some chips here and there well why not yeah rely on some chips but
07:49whatever they're doing whatever he's doing they're averaging 30 points a game after four games
07:55so something's working right yeah and and and last year they finished second in the nfl in total yards
08:05so you know i i think sometimes it's like well yeah that's gonna improve well i don't think
08:12anybody's got a perfect offensive line uh and and so yeah is is he the best tackle out there
08:19in the league no he's not but they knew that uh but can he be okay to good uh i
08:27think at times in
08:28run blocking he does a really good job but we judge it on pass blocking for sure that's where all
08:34the
08:34highlights are not and that's not his forte right yeah um so you know with him at right tackle last
08:43year they had a 1200 yard rusher uh the second most yards on offense uh so you know yeah do
08:54you want
08:55better sure you do and how much you're going to pay to to pay to get better when you're paying
09:00some of
09:01these other guys what you're paying them on the offensive line a billion dollars uh well and i'm
09:06not trying to excuse it or anything right no it's just this is what they're saying they're with kind
09:11of the facts right well but i don't know if you will consider this a a fact but the next
09:17one i was
09:18curious about was a lot of talk early this season about nick sorensen the special teams coach and i
09:26know shoddy yesterday i believe it was said they would have some changes when it comes to i believe
09:33field goal protection what have would have been some of the failures there because that's been
09:37pretty rough to start the season yeah absolutely well it's been sort of personnel changes i think he was
09:45referring to yeah um now the first block if you go back and look um the the guy on the
09:54outside
09:55jumped the count and i'm not so sure he wasn't off sides right and i think terence steel reacted to
10:02that and he went outside because generally the guy on the wing there is taught to you you're going to
10:10have to deal with two guys first uh you take the inside guy with one hand and then go get
10:18the outside
10:19guy because the outside guy's got further to go so chances are as long as you take care of the
10:25inside
10:26guy first who's got a shorter distance then you worry about the outside guy well he he did outside
10:33first and then the next guy inside turned in uh and the guy came scot-free and then in this
10:43last
10:43game if you go back and look uh broderick jones just fell down he he was supposed to block uh
10:50will
10:51anderson and and and he totally whiffed but he was on the ground he fell he can't do that so
10:56here comes
10:57that guy scot-free now i'm i'm sure when they designed the blocking schemes it wasn't designed
11:04to have those things happen so someone would hope not always the coaching it's sometimes it's the
11:10personnel not doing what they're supposed to do i do want to see that install though there were
11:15they're like all right you guys just fall down on the ground and we'll see what happens good luck
11:19brandon aubry you know what i've i've always see i've always thought that could work on offense
11:25is you just have like a faux handoff and your running back just falls down and then it looks like
11:32you're scrambling and panicking but then he's wide open for a little then i would use the shovel pass
11:38and you go see with the snaps for the quarterback acts like it went over his head when it's a
11:42direct
11:43snap to the running back there's all sorts of fun things in the world all right you know what mickey
11:47is maybe maybe what you want is a fake handoff and let the guy just fall forward then they'll think
11:52the play is over see okay well as long as we're talking about trickeration and potentially fourth
11:58down and special teams i've always wanted this to happen where you go out there and act like you're
12:04going to go for it on fourth and one and the the tv announcers are always skeptical and they're like
12:10i don't know and then you do a whole bunch of false counts and you run the clock below five
12:15seconds and
12:16everyone's like yeah they're not going to really snap but then in one second you snap it and you
12:20catch them off the quarterback to walk off just a little bit acting like at the timeout but it's a
12:25direct snap to the running back i feel like we could pull this off mickey what what yard line would
12:30you like to do that at uh you know i'm a bit of a gambler so i'm open 50 or
12:36you want to be at your
12:3835 doing you know probably not that i i apart from my 35 i do feel like i would at
12:44least need to be
12:45at midfield to be fair now i want to go back to the pass rush for just one second i
12:51i realized this
12:52would be a short-term thing but would you like to see an active james houston and do you think
12:59in
12:59short bursts that could make a difference for getting some more heat on the quarterback
13:04yeah and i mean he's had his moments he's i think he's finally healthy now um so from a spot
13:13uh usage
13:15i mean it can't hurt right i mean they've got what four sacks right and and the and the leader
13:23it you got three tied for the lead with one oh man right and then the other sacks a half
13:31a sack with
13:32two guys so and by the way that's that's like last in the league i think or maybe somebody has
13:39three
13:40uh so yeah uh if you want to get creative that's fine if you want to put them out there
13:46in definite
13:47pass situation you give him a give him a shot uh i mean he did have five last year right
13:55yeah
13:55five and a half i think or five and a half because he was tied for the lead until clowny
14:01got the three
14:01in the final game of the season so yeah um didn't sound like you're fully sold on this plan
14:11i'm not telling the truth because i would fear that they run the ball and he's really not a run
14:18stopper sure um so um but yeah give him give him some snaps uh especially if if he's active right
14:27if he's out there use them um use what you got because usually in in in those situations when
14:35they're in nickel um yeah you're you're you're down to a four-man line he's just not built to be
14:42a
14:42three four outside linebacker i don't think right so you're not going to use him there but if you want
14:49to give him a shot um yeah now you're taking somebody off the field right yeah yeah the rocku gary
15:00miller um personally although those guys need to get going yeah i i thought gary played his best
15:07game of the season over the weekend i would consider it i would consider vaughn miller i don't know if
15:13the cowboys are apt to consider that but i would well and you know he's averaging now right around 20
15:21snaps a game so they're kind of they're kind of using him in situations where we really need
15:28something or we need a big play and and that's kind of how he fits on this uh on this
15:34defense
15:35and i don't know that you want to overdo it but yeah they could use a little bit more from
15:41him too
15:41by the way as a designated pass rusher right i agree for sure excellent stuff as always best of
15:49luck to the white socks today and we'll catch you tomorrow and we'll make our picks tomorrow that's
15:56right that's why would we make our picks on friday game day i was i was prepared for today but
16:04i will
16:05be with you tomorrow for sure ready to go you better not change it by tomorrow it's gonna be the
16:11same as
16:11today a lot of research more time to think about it okay don't overthink it thank you very much
16:16remember there's that saying think long and think wrong yeah there you go it's true okay there you
16:22go mickey spagnola from tallascowboys.com
