Blogging The Boys
Their record will read 0-1, but the Dallas Cowboys did some good things that should get fans feeling much better about the 2025 season than they might have felt heading into the game. Back in 2021, the Cowboys headed down to Tampa Bay to face the Buccaneers on opening night and ultimately lost a close match. However, the offense was humming, Dak Prescott was back to being healthy again, and the defense showed signs of improvement, all of which eventually led to a 12-5 season.
There is still a long season ahead, and no one knows if 12-5 is an achievable feat, but the Cowboys showed similar glimpses to opening night in 2021 that may signal this team has a little more fight in it than previously expected.
It would have been interesting to see if Dak Prescott and the offense would have been just as effective to open the game if Jalen Carter were on the field. That never happened because Carter’s inability to remain composed for more than six seconds after kickoff led to him being ejected from the game before it really started.
With Carter in the locker room, Dallas had a magnificent game plan to open the season, blending the run and the pass. The one thing that stuck out immediately was the use of motion, specifically with KaVontae Turpin. The Dallas wide receiver was used in motion at a career high rate of 53.8% (14 times, including nine in motion at snap), almost double his motion rate from last season (23.8%), per NFL Pro.
The use of motion is a massive distinction from what was done under Mike McCarthy and his offense, especially during his last year, when things felt stuck in the mud. The Cowboys’ offense scored points on their first four drives, stunning the Philadelphia crowd, and Dallas was trailing just one point before halftime.
Dallas once again started marching down the field after the Eagles took a 24-20 lead on their first possession of the second half, and drew up a beautiful run down the sidelines by Miles Sanders. The fumble to follow and the weather delay stalled the offense’s progress, as they would not score again for the rest of the game. On paper, it didn’t look like the most incredible night in the world for Schottenheimer’s first game, but if you dust away the drops from CeeDee Lamb and the fumble from Sanders, things look a lot prettier and should give fans hope moving forward this year.
During Rod Marinelli’s tenure as Dallas’s defensive coordinator, one of his lessons always sticks in the back of my mind whenever the Cowboys play a mobile quarterback. Marinelli would say, “You have to keep them in the well,” meaning keep them in the pocket. Don’t let them run around and break free.
On Thursday night, the Cowboys continued to...
