Concern not Panic best bet for Cowboy fans

Listen, the NFL preseason and its results are over analyzed these days by all the gurus; that's because there really isn't much going on toward the end of summer as August fades into the history books. Phil Simms made some valid points while doing the Cowboys v Texans game on Saturday night. The first point was that the Texans admittedly game planned for the contest while the Cowboys were plain vanilla or as Simms put it, "Dallas is running offensive and defensive schemes that are 1st day of training camp installs". So, let's not over react to the Texans 23-7 win as it is no more impressive than Green Bay's 38-17 thrashing of Indy.

The preceding being said, I would be concerned about a couple of things with the Cowboys. Let's first talk about what doesn't concern me; I am not concerned one ounce about the defense. When you have talent (Dallas has plenty of it) then defense is about effort and scheme. The Cowboys had neither in Houston on Saturday night. While I am not going to make excuses for the lack of effort- these guys get paid enough money to try hard whenever they are on the field- I will say that Dallas did not blitz at all. When Houston went to 4 WR sets, the Dallas counter is almost always to blitz and make the QB make quick decisions, they didn't do that. Dallas was 2nd in the NFL in points allowed in 2009, I don't expect that to change much in 2010- this group is talented and tough.

Here is what does concern me; the Cowboys utter lack of effort along the offensive line. I know, I know, Colombo and Kosier were out. So what, Montrae Holland and Alex Barron get paid a nice chunk of change to back-up those positions and it's uncommon to go through an entire season without injuries thus your back-up lineman better be ready to play. I saw far too many jailbreaks when Romo went back to pass and I saw absolutely no push in the running game. The only word that can be used to describe the effort of the offensive line was well, "offensive".

My other main concern about this team is one that parallels life in general; some people don't handle success well and in thinking about that I wonder if this team knows how to handle success. Let me throw this out there, in 2006 the Cowboys lost the Romo fumbled FG playoff game in Seattle 21-20. Going into 2007 the questions abound about whether Romo could play in the NFL or recover from such a mistake and all the Cowboys did was go 13-3, winning the NFC East. The following year, Jerry Jones brought in Tank Johnson, PacMac Jones etc. etc. and supposedly loaded up for a Super Bowl run, in case your memory needs some jogging, the Cowboys went 9-7 and were eliminated on the season's final Sunday in Philadelphia 44-6. Ouch!!

Fast forward to 2010, the Cowboys coming off a very successful 2009 campaign which saw them win football's best division the NFC East with an 11-5 mark. The team won at New Orleans (the eventual Super Bowl Champion) late in the season, posted back to back shutouts of Washington and Philadelphia to finish the regular season (the first time that happened in the Cowboys' illustrious 50-years history) and won a playoff game handily over the Eagles 34-14. The Cowboys spent the entire summer reading about how they could host the Super Bowl in their stadium after this season ends.

I will leave you with this question; are the Cowboys "paper Champions" for 2010? Right now, we don't have the answer to the question but what I can tell you is that if they don't improve their execution and effort while amping up their intensity they may want to put in ticket requests with their owner right now as the "Big Game" is bound to be sold out.

2010 Opening Power Rankings

I will be doing my power ranking (top 10 only) from week to week. The following represents my opening power rankings with the reason for my ranking next to each ranking.

1. New Orleans Saints- The defending champ should open at #1 until proven otherwise

2. Indianapolis Colts- They won the AFC, they have the first or second best QB in the league

3. Dallas Cowboys- return 20 of 22 starters, no real weakness other than OL depth

4. Minnesota Vikings- great talent but they start a 41 yr old at QB coming off a career season

5. San Diego Chargers- don't care about Jackson and McNeil holdouts, this team is deep!

6. Baltimore Ravens- Love what they did this off-season, Flacco is a very good QB

7. NY Jets- lots of changes from a teach that reached AFC Title in 2009, why?

8. Green Bay Packers- Aaron Rodgers is terrific but they benefited from an easy 2009 slate

9. New England Patriots- They still have Brady and Bellichek which means they are dangerous

10. Atlanta Falcons- Matt Ryan and Michael Turner are healthy, this team is solid

There you have it, my top 10 to start the season. Keep in mind, results and injuries will probably change this significantly when I do my next rankings on Sept 14.

Favre May Have Some Form of Mental Illness

Face it, every human wants to feel wanted. There is no denying the preceding statement, however when someone take it to the degree of a Brett Favre it borders on a mental illness. It's not enough that the guy is loved by millions of football fans throughout the country, it's not enough that people wear his jersey in malls, stadiums etc. throughout the country- no Brett Favre needs his annual mental masturbation from the team he is currently under contract with in order to "decide" that he wants to come back to play "one more year".

Hey, I understand that at 39, 40, 41 years old a player might be hesitant on playing another season. Any sane human being can understand why a 40 year old man may not want to be chased around a football field by guys who weight 300 lbs. and are 15 years his junior. What I believe irks most football fans is the fact that Favre makes a public spectacle out of this annual ritual and always come to a decision by mid-August. Seriously, anyone out there want to tell me that Favre hadn't decided earlier to come back for the 2010 season? I don't believe that Favre was on the fence for one minute, I do believe that he enjoys the fact that three grown men, teammates of his in Minnesota, got on a plane and flew to Mississippi to basically beg him to play one more year so they could perhaps realize their dream of winning a Super Bowl.

Pro athletes all have huge egos, there is no mystery there but Brett Favre appears to have an ego that puts some of the great egos to shame. When Favre says this is "definitely the last year" one can only hope as it will spare us another summer of "will he or won't he play?"

NFL Best Run but Most overexposed Pro Sports League

Before I go any further let me first admit that I love the NFL. I have been a Dallas Cowboys fan my entire life, since age 6, despite living in Pennsylvania and being surrounded by Eagles, Steelers and Giants fans. There is nothing easier or more fun to follow than the NFL. The NFL is easily the best run professional sports league in the world from a business and marketing perspective. The preceding being said, the NFL is easily the most overexposed league in the world as well.

Seriously, when an NFL star has a bowel movement that doesn't go well, we get John Clayton, Chris Mortenson, Mike Golic, Deion Sanders et al analyzing said bowel movement to death on ESPN, NFL Network etc. etc. I find myself more and more reading what I want to read about the league and tuning out the "talking heads" because to be quite frank, their opinion is not much better than mine.

Yes, many of these talking heads did play the game but that doesn't mean they know what's going to happen on Sunday any more than I do. Just because one is good at playing a sport doesn't necessarily mean they are good at analyzing the sport.

That's where this forum comes in; meetthecowboys.com is designed to discuss the Cowboys and any other NFL team you want. Feel free to comment on my blogs and interact with each other. It's a good place to get/give information about your favorite team, give opinions, discuss fantasy football and just enjoy the National sport of our great country, NFL Football.

Enjoy the season!!

Emil