As Tom Brady watched the Dallas Cowboys’ offense try to rally from a 28-6 third-quarter deficit, the seven-time Super Bowl champion acknowledged his analysis might sound trite.
“To say, ‘We want to get off to a fast start,’ well, of course, we know that,” Brady said.
He then explained why an early start means more than just a lighter day at the office.
“You get to play on your own terms; your whole playbook is helpful,” Brady said last weekend during the Cowboys’ loss to the Baltimore Ravens. “At this point in the game, (the Cowboys) don’t have their whole playbook. You basically have some downhill runs and then back passes, which plays to the strength of this defense.”
The Cowboys’ playing formulas have routinely reflected wide scoring margins during head coach Mike McCarthy’s time at the helm.
Since McCarthy arrived in 2020, 48 of the team’s 70 games featured a lead or deficit of at least 14, according to a Yahoo Sports analysis of Pro Football Reference data.
All three of its 2024 games have fallen into that category.
The Cowboys’ Week 1 win against the Cleveland Browns marked their 28th victory in 29 games in which they led by at least 14 under McCarthy.
Dallas’ losses in Weeks 2 and 3 to the New Orleans Saints and Ravens brought them to 17 losses in 19 games when they trailed by 14 or more at any point.
Bottom line: If they get ahead early, the Cowboys will win by a landslide. If they fall behind early, the Cowboys will narrow their deficits, but rarely overcome them.
Dallas’ strength in playing with a lead and its fight to regain it speaks to more than just the psychological impact of a lopsided game or the apparent relative strength of an opponent.
The trends also reflect how scoring margins impact play-callers in general, and how strongly the Cowboys’ approach to roster construction has influenced their ability to respond to each situation.
When the Cowboys return to MetLife Stadium on Thursday night a year after beating the New York Giants 40-0 and 49-17 in their two meetings, Dallas is coming off two weeks of a taste of its own medicine. Every NFC East club knows how much the first half of the game will weigh on the outcome.
“We’ve got to find a way to be better at the game and start the game better,” Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott said. “Do the things we do at a high level … earlier and put pressure on the defense. When we can do that, then we can run, we can make trick plays, we can do whatever we want.”
“That’s what I hope to do.”
What would an early swing mean for the Cowboys and Giants’ game coordinators?
The Cowboys lost by 25 points to the Saints two weeks ago before trailing by 22 points in the third quarter against the Ravens.
So the offensive playmaking has taken a hit.
“We were down, we were talking about a no-huddle, two-minute play midway through the third quarter,” McCarthy said. “We need to get more rushing attempts, we need to get in and out of concepts, and I think that in itself will help us.”
What types of concepts could the Cowboys integrate more without the deficit?
Teams vary in how they account for situational football and the thresholds at which their playbook begins to shrink due to scoring margin.
But one NFC assistant coach estimated that “two-thirds of your talent is lost” when a more rushing offense comes into play. The simplified playbook begins with Brady’s description of dropback passes and downhill runs, but it doesn’t end there.
“When you’re in two-minute mode and you’re operating at the line of scrimmage, your shifts and motions go out the window,” the NFC assistant said. “All of your coverage identifications go out the window because you don’t have time to gesture to the backs and see who’s traveling with them; you just have to line up and go.”
Time becomes too valuable to spend replacing personnel packages or communicating extensively before every play. Not only do running plays evaporate, but so do some passing plays married to running plays in the original game plan.
“You can’t afford to be able to play 40 seconds on every play,” said another NFC assistant. “You need to gain ground quickly.”
Opinions varied on how quickly a team should switch to a rushing offense if facing a deficit; the scale generally slides from the third quarter to the fourth and from a two-score deficit to three.
But it’s no secret how much defenses covet their teams getting early leads. On Thursday Night Football last week, Aaron Rodgers shocked everyone when he shoved New York Jets head coach Robert Saleh and said something that was initially intelligible.
The magic words: “two-point lead.”
Scoring margin drastically impacts Cowboys defense
Across the Jets’ locker room last Thursday at MetLife, the offensive skill players knew why Rodgers was so eager to relay the 14-0 lead to his head coach.
Saleh often talked about that threshold as the point at which he frees up his pass rush to hunt more, and his secondary is eager to reap the benefits of steals that become more likely in obvious passing situations.
Still, the Jets’ 14-point lead against the Patriots last week was just their seventh game in which they had that advantage in Saleh’s four seasons. The Cowboys, by comparison, had held a 14-point lead in 27 games during that span.
“It’s something we haven’t done a lot of, and we’ve put our defenses in tough situations the three years I’ve been here,” receiver Garrett Wilson said. “So that’s what we emphasized all week: Let’s start fast and see what happens. Seven sacks. The (opponent) is backing up and has to pass the ball.
“That’s the kind of thing that can happen.”
The Cowboys know this all too well. When they take the lead, McCarthy’s play sheet isn’t the only one celebrating.
Dallas’ defense shines brightest when Micah Parsons, DeMarcus Lawrence and Co. can rush the passer, a strength the Saints and Ravens largely neutralized by first running more than passing and then building a lead so early that they didn’t need to pass much.
Note that Parsons, an All-Pro, pressured the passer just 17 and 15 times in Weeks 2 and 3, respectively, after wreaking havoc in Cleveland for 48 bursts.
“When you’re in an up-and-down situation, you look at trends,” New York Giants head coach Brian Daboll said this week. “You call games differently depending on how things are going in the game.”
The Cowboys lead the league by limiting opponents to a 32.8% success rate when pressuring four defenders.
But they rank last in run defense, in yards, touchdowns and efficiency each.
The Giants will look to avoid the early hole they fell into during their 2023 matchups with the Cowboys in an attempt to exploit a clear weakness.
“We just want to play complementary football,” Giants outside linebacker Kayvan Thibodeaux said. “We have to stop them and the offense will continue to do the best it can to score points.
“And that’s how we’re going to get there in the end.”
