00:00A special treat. Normally NickEatmanDallasCowboys.com, but I was like, when's the last time that Archer has been unleashed?
00:09Always putting up big numbers on the YouTube. I should never have told him that in the Indy because then
00:13his price went up.
00:14So then we haven't heard from him for a while. So I was like, Bobby, see if we can get
00:18old Todd back on the show.
00:20And the ESPN Cowboys Insider is joining us now on Sean and RJ 105.3 The Fan.
00:26Good morning, man. How you been?
00:28What's my song coming out of the bullpen?
00:31Oh, man. That's a good one. What should it be?
00:34What do you think, Todd? What do you think, Todd?
00:36Boston. I was about to say Boston. Yeah, it's like more than a feeling or something.
00:42Sure.
00:43You're probably more an Aerosmith guy then, right?
00:47Aerosmith used to rehearse at a golf course in the next town over from where I grew up.
00:54Oh, that's a great call to that.
00:56Yeah. So you weren't at the you weren't at the yay concert with Jerry the other day.
01:00I was not there.
01:04Jerry with that photo with Kanye.
01:07Todd, you've been firing the questions off.
01:10I was highly entertained by your shoddy postgame locker room one.
01:14I think you had to repeat it for him to actually get it because I think he was a little
01:17bit perturbed off the initial question.
01:19But we've all been perturbed by this Cowboys season.
01:22Like, just fill in the blank.
01:23This Dallas Cowboys season has been what?
01:27A massive disappointment?
01:28Yeah.
01:29I mean, I don't know what else you could possibly say.
01:32You could just because and like, I always wondered, like, you know, we just set them up, setting the pins
01:38up to knock them down.
01:39And we were over evaluating everything and stuff.
01:42Right.
01:42And then when the season starts and you can everybody can just come in and just knock these things down
01:47and say, see, I told you so.
01:49It seems like that's there's a big joy that people get out of doing that.
01:53But being out there at training camp, watching them practice against the Rams and the Saints, it's like, OK, there's
01:59a little this is different than last year.
02:01Yeah.
02:01Is what I was thinking.
02:02And then it has not been different than last year.
02:06Do you think they still have a legit shot to win the NFC East?
02:10And what would that matter?
02:12Right.
02:12Well, that's the that's what would it matter is I guess you get to host a playoff game at home
02:16and lose to one of those other NFC West teams that will come in as a wild card.
02:21Right.
02:23But I mean, if you're a guy on the team, let's not look at it from our perspective.
02:27If you're a guy on the team, you're you just Herm Edwards, you playing to win the game, you're playing
02:31to get in the playoffs.
02:32And then I think the worst thing, one of the worst things Jerry learned from Parcells was just get in
02:37the tournament and you have a chance.
02:39Yes.
02:39Do you?
02:40No.
02:41You know, so but for those guys, do they have a chance to win the NFC East?
02:47Yes.
02:47The Giants didn't do anything significant yesterday.
02:50Right.
02:50I mean, you know, I saw the Bichon thing, too, and I thought it was funny.
02:55So, yeah, it's there.
02:57And you look at the Giants schedule, the Cowboys schedule.
02:59So there's an opportunity for the Cowboys to make that week.
03:03What is that Giants game?
03:04The second to last game of the year.
03:06Interesting.
03:07But can you really count on the Cowboys to do enough to make it interesting?
03:11Because they're going to have to be one of these teams to make it interesting.
03:15San Francisco this week, Seattle on Monday Night Football at Seattle, the Rams or Jacksonville.
03:20So they're going to have to win one of those games, at least one of those games, and have
03:26the Giants lose some games because they're not losing games here at the moment.
03:29So I don't know where the faith comes in.
03:31It's a math equation at this point, and it doesn't seem to be one that favors the Cowboys.
03:36Todd Archer from ESPN, joining us here on 105.3 The Fan.
03:38Todd, you mentioned, like, it's been a massive disappointment, obviously.
03:41In reflection from the Joneses or Brian Schottenheimer or whoever, what do you think they would do
03:47differently, whether it be in the offseason or in the lead-up to the year?
03:50Would they have just put a Mike Pettin type with Christian Parker earlier than they did?
03:54Would they have looked at things differently in terms of their offensive line or how they
03:59want to approach the offense?
04:00What do you think they're looking at right now and saying, man, I wish we could have that
04:02decision back two months ago?
04:05I think they would have gone up a little bit more, and one of the three linebackers that
04:09turned them down in free agency, Quay Walker, N'Kobe Dean, or Devin Lloyd.
04:13I think that's been a position of angst the entire season for them.
04:19You went from DeMarvion Overshown as the Mike linebacker to Jayshon Barham for a few weeks,
04:25and now it's Shamar James.
04:27And Shamar James is doing a fine job, I guess, and making sure they're all lined up.
04:30But add those three names that we just talked about, who would you rather have?
04:35I think everybody would rather have that.
04:36Now, is that the number one thing?
04:38Boy, I don't know if that's the number one thing.
04:40I liked your idea of pairing a more veteran guy with Christian Parker from the beginning,
04:46and they did try to do that with Pettin, but he was just in the early romance of retirement,
04:52and I don't know if his wife would have allowed him to do that.
04:57So you kind of are where you are at that point.
04:59But to me, and Jerry has said this to you guys the last couple of Tuesdays,
05:04he's basically said, and if I'm wrong, tell me I'm wrong,
05:07you know, we kind of expected, once the season started okay and the defense was,
05:11you kind of expected that to be what it was going to be.
05:14But, man, this offense has not been anywhere close to what they thought it was going to be.
05:20However they thought they were evolving and improving on what they did last year
05:24has not been the case.
05:26They've not been anywhere close.
05:28I'm not even going to use the term that they've used.
05:30They've not even been anywhere close to what they were a year ago, offensively.
05:34Todd, you know, mentioning Pettin and him not being ready right away and him being here recently,
05:39what is your understanding of the exact role that he has here?
05:43Is it really just a tape-watching thing and a consultant thing, or what is his role here?
05:48Yeah, that's the way it's been explained to me.
05:50He's out, we've seen him out on the practice field in the last couple of weeks.
05:56But I don't know, he's not, you know, working with individual groups the way,
06:02who was Zimmer's guy a couple of years ago?
06:08He's at UNLV.
06:10I can't, whoever his name was.
06:11Gary Tartanian.
06:12Dang it, you took my joke.
06:14And then, and the same thing with George Edwards was with the linebackers when he was in that,
06:22I think had a similar title.
06:23He didn't have a position, but he was, so we're not seeing that with Pettin.
06:27So it's more of like, I think he's there to bounce things off of Christian.
06:32Hey, remember this?
06:33Hey, remember that?
06:34What about this?
06:34What about that?
06:35I think he's an idea guy and looking at the numbers,
06:39because he's keeping track of all of their calls, down and distances, what they're doing.
06:44He's the one who's charting the whole game out and has all that in front of him.
06:49So I think he's really in eyes and ears for Christian Parker on game day
06:54while being a film guy during the week.
06:56Todd Archer, ESPN here on 105.3 The Fan.
06:59What a surprise.
07:00Everyone wants Schottenheimer gone.
07:01Um, Fridays have become very uncomfortable.
07:04Uh, the tone of the press conferences has dramatically changed over the past two,
07:10three weeks, month.
07:11What has surprised you the most about the Schottenheimer job he's done coaching this year?
07:18I mean, you can't, he has to take the bulk of the issues with the offense, right?
07:26They've not had guys hurt.
07:28Yeah, Tyler Smith missed the first four games,
07:30but TJ Bass, we've all thought he was a, a starting type player.
07:35And so I'm not going to dock him for that at the first four games.
07:39Um, but they've had everybody, you know, okay.
07:43George didn't play last week.
07:44Well, CD missed three or four games last year.
07:46The offense still produced.
07:47Yeah.
07:48Um, so that's the biggest question of what has happened here.
07:54And, you know, last week, what did, and I haven't looked up the numbers and Bobby,
07:58maybe, you know, cause you're a stat geek, we hit them on the motion and you're a 30th
08:04in the league and you're last in motion at the snap.
08:07And they, well, then it appeared to be anyway, like they were doing more movement before the
08:12snap against Indianapolis and they ran some, Hey, get this guy's bunch formations.
08:16They did some of that too.
08:18So you're seeing some things.
08:20You saw some things last week that, okay, why weren't you doing this earlier?
08:24Like what was going on?
08:25And it's, uh, you know, he has to take the bulk of the blame for how the offense has performed
08:31because that's his deal.
08:34That's, that's why he was hired.
08:36He was hired to be the offensive coordinator and play caller.
08:38And last year it went extraordinarily well.
08:41And this year it's not, but as the head coach, I'll come back to, and now anyone get into
08:46the game management stuff.
08:47I know Bobby loves Ryan feeder.
08:49He's going to want to hurt his feelings, but I'll come back to the, the first thing he
08:57said is we're going to build this greatest culture in sports, right?
09:02I'm trying to find the last time a coach got fired because the culture was bad.
09:05They get fired and fired because they lose games.
09:08And I think you lose the plot at times when you're worried about ping pong in the locker
09:13room and corn hole in the locker room and shrimp, uh, shrimp, uh, whatever's, uh, you know,
09:20shrimp boils and paintball, like, come on, you know, give me the five plays in this game
09:26this week that is going to make the difference for this team to win a game.
09:30That third down stop that third down conversion.
09:33That's what matters most.
09:34Um, and I'm not saying culture, chemistry, brotherhood, all of it doesn't matter, but
09:41it can't be above football.
09:42Todd, I want to get in the, uh, Todd Archer time machine, go back to your old days, um,
09:47sitting just to the right of Parcells, that little table there.
09:50Uh, he had the penalty discussion.
09:52I don't coach penalties.
09:54Right.
09:54Um, it's a nice excuse, huh?
09:56Uh, okay.
09:59So like, cause I, I can only go back to as far as 06 to find the amount of penalties.
10:02Like, were they, did he have a highly penalized team the way this one is?
10:07Like, is that on the coach?
10:08Is that on the players?
10:08I mean, yes and yes.
10:11And I, you know, they, they were a highly penalized team.
10:14As I flipped through my media guide to find, uh, if I can find that, but you know, they've
10:19been, whoever has been the coach, this has been a highly penalized team.
10:23Yeah.
10:24Maybe not to certain levels.
10:25And even, you know, this year before the game for this past game, they're averaging
10:28seven.
10:29Some of them are like excusable into a degree, but some of them, and we're all going to remember
10:36whenever this, whenever, however, the Brian Schottenheimer coaching time ends with the
10:42Cowboys, everybody is going to talk about the DeMarvion overshone penalty.
10:47Yeah.
10:48Like it's those sort of penalties.
10:49It's, it's not the, um, you know, a hit to the head or, uh, the, you know, the combative
10:57penalties, right.
10:57Or, you know, the, there can be a hold every now and then it's going to be penalties like
11:01that, where it's like, what, what are you thinking?
11:04You know, like an illegal shift that they had against the Colts because two guys didn't
11:09get set quick enough after Dak made a call or Dak snapped it too early.
11:13However, that would have, however that transpired, like that's the sort of stuff where it's like,
11:17okay, that's on coaching.
11:19And I, and I think Schottenheimer has kind of missed an opportunity a little bit to send
11:24messages when it comes to certain elements of what, what he, what his expectations and
11:30desires are for the team.
11:31One overshone maybe should have been directed to the locker room after the game by their
11:35head of security cable.
11:36Johnson said, you can't do that.
11:38Go watch the game in the locker room.
11:40And then the other one, when CD says, Hey man, I owe you one.
11:43And your response is, no, you don't dude.
11:44You're a great player.
11:45You miss the opportunity to say you're damn right.
11:47You owe me one.
11:48Maybe, maybe even owe me two, like hold up the standard for these guys and don't as,
11:55as, as I'm going to steal a line from a buddy of mine that gave me Parcells used to tell
11:59these guys don't eat the cheese.
12:01Well, the coach can't feed him the cheese either.
12:03Well put.
12:04Do you think coaching jobs are on the line?
12:09Man, that's a hard one to say because it's Jerry and you never know.
12:13And I have him in my mind saying I regretted firing Chan Gailey after two years.
12:19So that's sticking with me here at the moment.
12:21Um, and I, and so I, I don't, I, I, I don't even want to go down the path of
12:29yes, no, or
12:29maybe I, only thing is that I don't know some coaches.
12:33Sure.
12:33There'll be some assistants that will, that won't be back, but, but I can't sit here and
12:37say, he's going to get rid of everybody.
12:40Now, if they go, what's their record?
12:42They go four and 13.
12:43Well, okay, let's talk week 18 and, and then we'll maybe have a different answer.
12:48Todd Arch from ESPN with us.
12:50Todd, uh, the future of Joey Porter and George Pickens, how would you handicap that right now
12:58in terms of the odds that those two are back here in 27?
13:01I would, I would say Porter has a better chance of being back than Pickens at the moment.
13:09Um, the ankle thing, let's see how that plays out and where that goes.
13:13And how much he can play the rest of the season.
13:16Um, the, the Pickens thing, it's going to be, you only have one franchise tag.
13:22Do you use it on Porter to use it on Pickens?
13:24Can you really get a long-term deal with Pickens?
13:27Do you want to sign George Pickens to a long-term deal?
13:30Um, let's remember they, they've gone seven, nine, and one, and now four and five essentially
13:35with them.
13:36Not all of that is on him.
13:37Obviously I'm not saying that, but if that's not the piece that puts you over the top, then
13:42you have to look at it.
13:44That's, that's why, you know, you start thinking about tag and trade come March and what could
13:50you get then?
13:51Or you think about a 2028 compensatory pick.
13:54But if you had to ask me which guy who I think will be back in 2027 right now, I
14:00would
14:00say Porter would have the better chance than George Pickens would.
14:03We missed you.
14:04This was special.
14:05This was fun.
14:06Very good.
14:07When we can afford and save up again, we'll do it again.
14:10There's only a few more innings in this arm.
14:13So, you know, I have to space it out.
14:15I'm not a guy who can throw every day.
14:17Thank you, brother.
14:18Baseball Todd.
14:19Baseball Todd.
14:20Thank you, Todd.
14:20Appreciate you.
14:21See you guys.
