2014 Team/Player Spotlight -- Dallas Cowboys (1 Viewer)

2014 Team & Player Spotlight Series

One of Footballguys best assets is our message board community. The Shark Pool is, in our view, the best place on the internet to discuss, debate and analyze all things fantasy football. In what's become an annual tradition, the Player Spotlight series is a key part of the preseason efforts. We are trying something different this year. We will still publish more than 100 PLAYER SPOTLIGHT articles on the main site. But we are going to solicit discussion on them in these TEAM threads.

Why the change?

NFL success is contingent on the sum of a team's parts. To think that a wide receiver succeeds simply because of himself would be foolhardy. What if a team has three excellent fantasy WR options (e.g., Denver with Demaryius Thomas, Wes Welker and Emmanuel Sanders)? Is a person's enthusiasm for a given player being properly offset against lesser expectations for one of their teammates?

Frankly, there was a lot of redundancy in former Spotlight threads. Asking you all to discuss the Giants new OC Ben McAdoo in threads for Eli Manning, Victor Cruz, Odell Beckham and Rashad Jennings seems inefficient. Now, in this new format, you can factor McAdoo (or any other team change) and it's impact on ALL the relevant skill players.

Thread Topic: Dallas Cowboys

The NEW Rules

In order for this thread to provide maximum value, we ask that you follow a few simple guidelines:

• Focus commentary on the fantasy relevant players in question, and your expectations for said players
• Back up your expectations in whatever manner you deem appropriate; avoid posts that simply say "I hate him" or "He's the best"
• Avoid redundancies or things like "good posting" ... this should be about incremental analysis or debate

While not a requirement, we strongly encourage you to provide your own projections for the relevant players on each team. We would note that it's important that your statistics makes sense. For example, projecting two running backs on the same team with 2,000 yards is an obvious gaffe. You might have three WR/TEs projected for 1,000+ yards, but that would be aggressive and a historical rarity. Back it up.

Projections should include:

• For QBs: Attempts, Completions, Passing Yards, Passing TDs, Ints, Rush Attempts, Rush Yards, Rush TDs
• For RBs: Rushes, Rushing Yards, Rush TDs, Receptions, Receiving Yards, Receiving TDs
• For WRs & TEs: Receptions, Receiving Yards, Receiving TDs

Recommended Players to Discuss (Player Page links provided):

QB Tony Romo

RB DeMarco Murray

WR Dez Bryant

WR Terrance Williams

TE Jason Witten

Each PLAYER SPOTLIGHT article will include:

• Detailed viewpoint from a Footballguys staff member
• Links to thoughtful viewpoints from around the Web, including intriguing pull quotes from this thread
• FBG Projections

I think we will see same old/same old out of the likes of Romo, Witten and Bryant and a step forward for Williams and Murray. I know Murray had a career year last year, but the table is set for much more this year as they tended to shy away from him at times last year.

Tony Romo - This assumes 15-16 games played. I think we at least one more solid year of Romo, and he would make a fine QB1 if needed. 4100 yards, 32 TDs, 14 INTs negligible rushing stats.

DeMarco Murray - Maybe we see 16 games from him this year. Murray has what you look for in a RB, he can make people miss, he can block and he can catch. He can take it to the house as well. If I go WR in Round 1, I would be happy with Murray as my RB1. 270 - 1275 - 10 and 45 - 300 - 2.

Dez Bryant - Another year of studly stats from one of the very best in the game. He is an absolute beast anywhere on the field, and will continue to dominate. 95 - 1300 - 13 with potential for even more.

Terrance Williams - He will be asked to shoulder more of a load this year, and I think he will have a nice 2nd year. Bryant, Witten and Murray commanding targets will keep him in check a bit, but I still see good things. 52 - 800 - 6.

Jason Witten - Witten will do what Witten always does best, clean up underneath and grab a few TDs here and there. A great TE1 option still. 80 - 900 - 7.

If my math serves me correct, I am leaving about 800 yards and 4 TD's to go elsewhere, or even get swallowed up by the guys above.

I'll take a stab at this.

Scott Linehan is the new OC and will be calling the plays for Dallas this year. He spent the last 5 seasons as Detroit's OC. Over the past 3 years, Stafford has averaged 675 pass attempts per year under Linehan. And now Linehan comes to a Dallas team that over the past 3 years has had the fewest rush attempts in the NFL (22.8 per game). He's said he wants to lean more on Demarco Murray and the run game, but it seems that everything in his past and in Dallas's recent past points to a lot of passing for the Cowboys in 2014.

Tony Romo:

Romo is currently recovering from surgery on a herniated disk that took place back in December. But all reports seem to indicated his recovery is going well and that he should be good-to-go well before Week 1 rolls around. Romo had a bit of a disappointing season in 2013, with over 100 fewer pass attempts. When you consider that 500 yds and 5 TDs came in 1 game against Denver, it was definitely a down year for him. Now he has Scott Linehan directing the offense, so you would assume his attempts would get closer to 600 this year. As I recall, Romo struggled with various injuries for a good part of the season.

I think another factor to consider is how bad this defense is projected to be. They were the worst defense in 2013, giving up 415 yds per game to opposing offenses. They were bad against the pass and the run. They released Demarcus Ware. Sean Lee is out for the season with a torn ACL. They picked a DE in round 2 of the draft and an OLB in round 4. I don't know of any big name FAs they've signed on defense. I expect close to 600 attempts considering Linehan's coaching and how atrocious this defense should be.

Demarco Murray:

He stayed healthy for most of the year (missed only 2 games in 2013) and had a great year with 1100+ rushing yds while averaging 5.2 yds/carry. He finally posted a respectable number of TDs (9) and added 53 receptions. Interesting notes:

He only averaged 15.5 carries/game, getting at least 20 carries only once in the final 11 weeks. 2014 is the last year of his rookie contract. Murray led all RBs (min 50 attempts) in yds/carry against base defenses in 2013.

It seemed that Dallas gave up on the running game way too soon last year. Even when they had the lead, they would have Romo throw it instead of the more sensible call of having Murray run out some clock and hopefully move the chains. It was bizarre at times. Scott Linehan has said he wants to lean more on Murray and the run game. ESPN Dallas has said they expect Murray to set a career-high in carries this year. Beat man Todd Archer expects 250 carries for Murray and for him to play on the majority of the passing downs as well. I'm not sure if I completely believe that and i'm not sure I'm completely sold on him being able to stay mostly healthy during a 250 carry season. 1st round pick Zach Martin can only help though.

Lance Dunbar has been compared to Reggie Bush by Linehan, so I wonder if they try to give him more receptions out of the backfield in 2014.

Dez Bryant and Terrance Williams:

I have really enjoyed Dez's transformation from somewhat of a knucklehead to one of the harder workers in the NFL. By all accounts, he's continued his rigorous offseason workout regimen and should be ready for another monster season. His yds/reception fell in 2013 to 13.3, but his TDs (13) remained high as usual. With a fully recovered Romo, I see no reason not to expect another 90+ catch, 1200+ yd, 10+ TD season from Dez.

Terrance Williams is an interesting player. With no Miles Austin and with Dez pulling double coverage his way, Terrance Williams seems poised for a nice 900-1000 yd season in my opinion. After a hot start, he fizzled over the 2nd half of the season last year. He did manage to post a stat-line of 44-736-5 while playing on only 68.2% of the snaps last year. Now in his 2nd year and now a full-time starter opposite Dez, I think he's a great "breakout" candidate or at least a player that has the potential to really post numbers above where he is being drafted. If Romo throws 560-570 passes, I think 60 receptions for Williams is very reasonable. If, however, Romo throws 580-600+ passes in the new Linehan system, then I could certainly see 70+ receptions and a nice payday for fantasy owners.

Jason Witten:

Finally Dallas figured out how to use Jason Witten in the redzone. His 8 TDs in 2013 were the 2nd highest total of his career, although his yardage (851) dipped a bit because of the general mediocrity of the passing game last year. Witten is now 32 years old, but I don't see too many signs why his magnificent career would take a downturn in 2014. An 80 catch season seems about par for the course now.

Romo: 374 completions, 590 attempts, 7.4 yds/attempt, 4366 yds, 30 TDs, 15 INTs. 20 rushes, 40 yards, 1 TD

Murray: 230 rushes, 4.5 yds/rush, 1035 yds, 8 TDs. 45 receptions, 315 yds, 2 TDs

Bryant: 95 receptions, 1330 yds, 11 TDs

TWilliams: 65 receptions, 975 yds, 6 TDs

Witten: 78 receptions, 858 yds, 6 TDs

This is simply a strange team. Think about this. The Cowboys finished 31st in the NFL in rushing attempts in 2013. But they finished 8th in YPC average. To fix their offense, they went with an offensive coordinator whose reputation practically boasts of ignoring the rushing attack in Scott Linehan. I guess when you are dealing with Jerry Jones as your Owner/GM, you are going to see synergy breakdowns like this but this seemed especially off. Now, one of the primary reasons for this gulf in concentration versus performance is that Dallas truly lacked a #2 RB to off-load rushing attempts to. Lance Dunbar flashed, but prior to his injury, he only tallied 50 carries.

To be fair, they probably maxed out DeMarco Murray as it related to his workload. In 13.25 games, he tallied 270 touches. And despite missing close to 3 games, Murray was on the field for 690 snaps good for 10th amongst NFL RB’s. In addition, they also failed to hold an opponent under 21 points after Week 7. That can put a crimp in how heavily you can rely on your ground game. But if you’ve got a horse like Murray, to have a 65/35 pass-run ratio…well, I find fault in that. And the Cowboys have transitioned to an OC who is almost as pass friendly.

Consider Linehan’s 5 year stint in DET, he had a 63:37 pass-run ratio. Now, it’s possible he never had a talent like Murray who is as adept in the passing game as he is being a physical runner. But more balanced runass ratios are built off effective use of more than 1 RB. And while a lot of platitudes are being thrown Lance Dunbar’s during OTA’s, it’s taken a lot for Linehan to be an effective user of 2 RB’s (he did this well with Bush/Bell in 2013 however). But even so, the Lions couldn't be confused with a team that ran the ball with the type of frequency you'd expect out of a balanced offense. What we do know though is that Linehan’s offenses in Detroit generated an average of 1084 offensive plays/season. When you consider that Dallas only ran 957 offensive plays in 2013, there is some volume room to take advantage of in this offense. But you’ll have to pick your spots wisely.

Tony Romo – For most of his career, Romo has been one of the better QB’s at pressing defenses downfield. In his 4 seasons prior to 2013, his YPA was a healthy 7.85, the most glaring aspect of Romo’s 2013 season was a precipitous drop down to 7.16. Take out his mostly otherworldly game against DEN when he gamely battled Peyton Manning and that YPA figure drops to 6.66. For all intents and purposes, Romo turned into a dink and dunk QB. I don’t think that was a function of Romo’s inability to throw the ball downfield anymore. I’d attribute it to 1) DAL’s realization that their defense was garbage so they needed Romo to Hank Stram the ball down the field in order to have a chance to stay in games and 2) the relative inexperience he was dealing with in his receiving corps. Terrance Williams had his moments during his rookie year, but with Miles Austin surprisingly banged up…Williams and Cole Beasley became integral pieces to the Cowboys passing attack. With defenses clamping down on Dez Bryant, it actually led to a relatively subpar passing season for Romo and if Dez Bryant owners are being honest, a season on the low side from a yardage perspective.

In DET though, counting sacks, Lions QB’s under Linehan never totaled less that 628 drop backs. And in his last 3 seasons, they averaged 709. So there is definitive upside from a volume perspective with Romo purely related to workload. Granted, Romo was on pace for his 2nd highest season attempt total, but there is reason to believe he’ll exceed 600 attempts in 2014. Couple that with 1) Dez Bryant making a contract push 2) Terrance Williams, Cole Beasley and Gavin Escobar continuing their development and 3) a DAL defense that might be the worst in the league…Romo seems EXTREMELY overlooked as a bounceback candidate. At QB12, he’s being drafted amongst his peers around where he was being drafted in 2013…but it’s also about 2 rounds later.

DeMarco Murray – I thought Murray had by far his best season and when I look at ADP’s, I’m a little shocked that he’s going early 2nd round as RB9. I mean Montee Ball ahead of a guy who went for 1471/10 in little over 13 games last season? Now part of the reason folks I think still don’t ‘buy’ Murray is his tendency to get nicked up. He dealt with an MCL issue last year, but unlike 2012 when his ankle injury lingered and turned what was thought to be a 2 week injury into a 6 week one, in 2013, he kind of flipped that equation, by turning a 4 week injury into a 2 week one.

In 2013, he finished 8th amongst NFL RB’s in receptions so his multi-dimensionality is amongst the best in the NFL. And in an offense that could wind up passing the ball even more, it’s not beyond the realm of reason that Murray could approach (or exceed) 70 receptions. And it’s these types of easy yards that really put some distance between RB’s that are part of the passing game versus ones that aren’t. Also, for the first time in his career, Murray was quite successful at scoring from within the 5 yard line. All of his TD’s in 2013 actually came from within the 10. 23 carries from within the 10 resulted in 9 TD’s (versus 16 carries for 4 TD’s in his two seasons prior to). And without a legitimate big back to take snaps away from Murray down by the goal line, I don’t suspect we’ll see a decrease in this workload. Quite frankly, I’m not too certain I wouldn’t take Murray before Eddie Lacy and that’s despite the fact that Scott Linehan is quick to abandon the run game. It’s just that with Murray really being the only viable run game threat in DAL (no offense to Lance Dunbar fans, but his size precludes much of a role beyod 70-75 carries…) I think he’ll be fine FF wise.

Dez Bryant – If I asked you the question, who was more dominant FF wise. The last 8 games of Dez Bryant in 2012 or the last 8 games of Josh Gordon in 2013, what would your answer be? Don’t peek below…

Bryant – 50/879/10
Gordon – 55/1064/6

But Bryant was the 2nd half game changer at WR in 2012 that Gordon was in 2013. And so when I alluded to Bryant having put up somewhat disappointing numbers in 2013, I think there were a lot of people thinking that it was Bryant who’d be in that 1500-1600 yard range. That 14-16 TD range. With that said, you also draft a guy like Bryant that high because his floor is essentially what he wound up giving owners. As such, he’s actually being drafted a bit higher than last year. So it’s obvious that people are believing in Bryant and that they are just as enthusiastic about his 2014 outlook as they were his 2013 outlook. I would tend to agree. There is nothing that’s happened in the last year that should have affected Bryant’s stock negatively with the exception of his back that has been balky from time to time over the last 2 seasons. If you are ultra-conservative on this front, that might steer you away from Bryant…but that’s about it.

Terrance Williams – if there is one thing young players have a tendency to struggle with, especially their rookie years…it’s a combination of consistency and stamina. Williams for all the flashes he showed in 2013 faded down the stretch. His catch percentage over the seasons final 9 games of 39.1% was the NFL WR equivalent of Shaquille O’Neal shooting free throws. Especially when contrasted against his 24-for-28 start. But with Miles Austin gone, the WR2 role in Dallas is essentially his. And if the DAL passing game is going to be leaned on, then despite the presence of Jason Witten who essentially can be counted to produce somewhere in the vicinity of 900-950/6-8. When a guy comes into the league described as ‘unpolished’ I worry about that receivers ability to gain a modicum of consistency. At this point, with an expanded opportunity in front of him, I don’t feel I’ll have a good handle on my expectation for Williams until I get a chance to see him, hear some TC reports. For now, I’ll project some conservative upgrades. But I’m not sold on this guy yet. I kind of get a Reuben Randle feel from him.

Jason Witten – As mentioned above, Witten is simply a guy who by the end of the year has put up one of the better TE seasons of the year. Except very rarely does an owner say ‘thanks God for Jason Witten’. He’s never been a prolific red zone type threat. Generally he’ll come in as incrementally better than the mediocre field at the position, but for the most part, the premium you pay for him seems to be higher than the value it’s worth. I don’t mind trading for Witten during the season because what generally seems to happen is that someone who did draft him feels underwhelmed by the return since they thought they were drafting strength at the position. But with 4 seasons of 1000 yards, his TD totals for them (9, 7, 3, 2) are mixed. Last year he made up for one of his lower yardage years with 8 TD’s. But we know what Jason Witten is at this point in his career. Even with a suspected stronger tendency to throw the ball, I’d be surprised to see Witten’s production increase much at this stage of his career. How much Gavin Escobar progresses in year 2 remains to be seen, but given the dearth of talent the Cowboys have at receiver, they’ll need more than the 9 receptions they got from him last season.

Cole Beasley – Beasley seems to follow one of the more underrated trends of the decade of undrafted Texas based small jitterbug slot receivers.

The problem I do see with the Cowboys passing game is that Dez Bryant is the only real true threat. 2 years ago, I think defenses still respected a healthy Miles Austin as a legitimate force. While Dez Bryant has only really become monster over the last year and a half, he seemed to come into the league drawimg a lot of defensive attention because his natural talent was so evident. It wasn’t until 2012 though, his 3rd year in the NFL where he came DAL’s de facto #1 WR. With Williams now opposite Bryant, I don’t see that as being a true credible threat in the passing game that if ignored can really hurt you. Whatever speed Witten had is gone, not that he had much to begin with. But the point I’m making is that I feel like there are gaps in the way DAL can attack you via the pass. It’s almost TOO Dez centric. Their running game is TOO DeMarco centric. And while both players are multi-dimensional talents, they need help. And I’m just not sure DAL has done enough to provide it.. Whilemost now remember Miles Austin as The Human Hamstring Pull, as recently as 2012, he went for 66/943/6 in 14.5 games. Also in that year, their #3 WR Kevin Ogletree was a 4 year veteran in DAL, There was some experience and familiarity. I don’t see that yet and the young talent like Willliams, Beasley and Escobar still feels raw and not dependable enough. Perhaps we’ll see that 1 or 2 of these guys establish themselves a bigger time players than they’ve proven to be. But I think quite frankly DAL is looking at a rough year in 2014.

Predictions

Romo – 386 Completions 602 Attempts 4418 Passing Yards 28 TD’s 15 INT’s.; 27 rushes 67 Rushing Yards 1 TD.
Murray – 275 Rushes 1298 Rushing Yards 7 TD’s; 62 Receptions 398 Receiving Yards 2 TD’s.
Dunbar – 62 Rushes 245 Rushing Yards 1 TD; 27 Receptions 227 Receiving Yards 1 TD.
Williams – 27 Rushes 98 Rushing Yards 0 TD’s. 3 Receptions 14 Receiving Yards
Bryant – 88 Receptions 1347 Receiving Yards 10 TD’s
Williams – 54 Receptions 823 Receiving Yards 4 TD’s
Witten – 69 Receptions 784 Receiving Yards 7 TD’s
Escobar – 22 Receptions 281 Receiving Yards 2 TD’s
Beasley - 48 Receptions 492 Receiving Yards 2 TD’s.