The Cowboys needed to get some clarity at several positions and the dress rehearsal game against the Vikings offered some answers.
Here are the players that stood out to me:
- Randy Gregory
- Davon Coleman
- Darren McFadden
- Morris Claiborne
- Lucky Whitehead
You have to like the hustle and speed of Randy Gregory, he’s going to pose some issues for some of the heftier tackles in the league. He seemed to be bringing the pressure on a regular basis and he recorded another sack.
Davon Coleman was an absolute beast tonight and I would say he’s locked up a spot on the 53-man roster. You cannot leave that type of pressure and playmaking off the team. I said he’s a 53-man keeper and I believe he’ll be part of the pressure rotation once the season starts.
Morris Claiborne played well enough to keep QBs from targeting him. I like how he covered his most of his assignments against the Vikings receivers. I’ll be honest, I did not think he would be the cornerback that would play as well as he did. He outplayed Brandon Carr.
Lucky Whitehead may have gotten back into the conversation of being the #5 WR on this team. Whitehead scored a TD catch from Tony Romo tonight and had a pretty good kick return for 37 yards.
Players that disappointed:
- Dustin Vaughan
- Brandon Carr
The Dustin Vaughan train has derailed. He looked terrible again, and looked too hesitant more often than not. There were moments in the game that made me wonder what the hell are we going to do if Romo goes down for any amount of time. We don’t have an answer at backup QB right now. Vaughan is terrible, and Weeden probably sticks around one more year despite not playing tonight. Showers didn’t do much better tonight.
Brandon Carr was being picked on with regularity and I was surprised it was him that was getting picked on. I would have thought Claiborne would have been the one getting targeted more, but that was not the case. I wonder if teams know Carr is an easy first down. Yes, he had the int, but that was a desperate toss-up pass and he was able to pull it down. Outside of the INT, he was garbage, and I wondered why this guy wasn’t asked to take a paycut.
Unfortunately, with the inconsistent play from the backup QBs, we could not get a better look at the receivers. I wanted to see if A.J. Jenkins would show up and he didn’t and the same for Geoff Swaim.
Special teams was bad again. I absolutely don’t buy the notion that some players on coverage won’t even be on the team once the season starts and that’s why the coverage is so bad. Last year we had the same issues most of the season. Hate to say it, but this may be a philosophy style that the players are not buying into — somethings not right.
Overall, I liked what I saw from the starting offense. They started out a bit sloppy, but after they settled down Romo was able to orchestrate two scoring drives.
It was a great sight seeing Sean Lee on the field and he looked like the old Lee, pretty active and get to the ball. Let’s hope he can stay healthy.
What did you think of the game?
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