GloryDaysRBack
Quality Starter
- Messages
- 5,080
- Reaction score
- 0
Football outsiders are covering the cowboys OL. Here's what they had to say about Smith in week 1.
The other real bright spot for Dallas’ pass protection was Smith. Smith was matched up against Jason Pierre-Paul for most of the game and he flat-out handled him. He gave up a couple of pressures, but certainly won the battle. Any time an offensive tackle gets the best of a Pro Bowl-caliber edge rusher it's an achievement, but the circumstances surrounding Smith’s victory were even more encouraging.
Watching the game back it became immediately clear that Bill Callahan’s plan was to leave Smith one-on-one with whoever was lined up over him and focus any help he could elsewhere. It was amazing how often Smith was left on an island. The Cowboys run a lot of man-based schemes, so naturally the tackles will receive less help in general. But when backs did chip, they chipped towards the right side and Doug Free (who also played very well, surprisingly), and when the Cowboys did slide their line, they slid it away from Smith. Take a look at these screen grabs below.
Just look at the amount of space in some of those pictures between Smith and his linemates. Notice that there is never anyone looking his way to see if he needs help either. He is a volleyball away from nailing a Tom Hanks impression. And he more than held his own out there.
This was a big vote of confidence by the Cowboys coaching staff in the opening week and Smith absolutely delivered. A lot of people are starting to think left tackles are becoming overvalued in the NFL and I understand where they’re coming from to a certain extent. But if you do land an elite left tackle, it makes the rest of your line’s job so much easier. When you can neutralize a defense’s best pass rusher with one man, you can double at other spots and cover up some deficiencies. (And the Cowboys guards are currently deficiencies. I think that will be a common topic in this column.)
The issue is that average left tackles, or even good ones, aren’t quite good enough to give you this schematic advantage. Yet you have to draft and pay them like they do. It’s why there’s been a bit of blind side backlash recently. But if you do land a good one, it’s still an absolute game changer.
Considering he’s still just a 22-year-old (22!), I may have caught the Cowboys at the perfect time to watch the breakout season of the NFL’s next great left tackle. Like the rest of the Cowboys unit, he needs to improve as a run blocker -- though he did look great in space -- but boy am I excited to watch him as the season progresses.
Here's the link to the rest of the piece...also has the pictures that are mentioned above.
http://www.footballoutsiders.com/word-muth/2013/word-muth-smith-island
The other real bright spot for Dallas’ pass protection was Smith. Smith was matched up against Jason Pierre-Paul for most of the game and he flat-out handled him. He gave up a couple of pressures, but certainly won the battle. Any time an offensive tackle gets the best of a Pro Bowl-caliber edge rusher it's an achievement, but the circumstances surrounding Smith’s victory were even more encouraging.
Watching the game back it became immediately clear that Bill Callahan’s plan was to leave Smith one-on-one with whoever was lined up over him and focus any help he could elsewhere. It was amazing how often Smith was left on an island. The Cowboys run a lot of man-based schemes, so naturally the tackles will receive less help in general. But when backs did chip, they chipped towards the right side and Doug Free (who also played very well, surprisingly), and when the Cowboys did slide their line, they slid it away from Smith. Take a look at these screen grabs below.
Just look at the amount of space in some of those pictures between Smith and his linemates. Notice that there is never anyone looking his way to see if he needs help either. He is a volleyball away from nailing a Tom Hanks impression. And he more than held his own out there.
This was a big vote of confidence by the Cowboys coaching staff in the opening week and Smith absolutely delivered. A lot of people are starting to think left tackles are becoming overvalued in the NFL and I understand where they’re coming from to a certain extent. But if you do land an elite left tackle, it makes the rest of your line’s job so much easier. When you can neutralize a defense’s best pass rusher with one man, you can double at other spots and cover up some deficiencies. (And the Cowboys guards are currently deficiencies. I think that will be a common topic in this column.)
The issue is that average left tackles, or even good ones, aren’t quite good enough to give you this schematic advantage. Yet you have to draft and pay them like they do. It’s why there’s been a bit of blind side backlash recently. But if you do land a good one, it’s still an absolute game changer.
Considering he’s still just a 22-year-old (22!), I may have caught the Cowboys at the perfect time to watch the breakout season of the NFL’s next great left tackle. Like the rest of the Cowboys unit, he needs to improve as a run blocker -- though he did look great in space -- but boy am I excited to watch him as the season progresses.
Here's the link to the rest of the piece...also has the pictures that are mentioned above.
http://www.footballoutsiders.com/word-muth/2013/word-muth-smith-island
Last edited:
