What are the Cowboys Thinking With This Offensive Line?

By:  Bobby Shores

With the Cowboys decision to cut ties with longtime (and former All-Pro and current Pro Bowl) center Andre Gurode today, the offensive line is the most remade and questionable unit not only in the Cowboys organization, but quite possibly the entire NFL.

Last year's line looked something like this (average age 30.4):

LT:  Doug Free
LG:  Kyle Kosier
  C: Andre Gurode
RG:  Leonard Davis
RT:  Marc Columbo

Now it looks like this (average age 25.2):

LT:  Doug Free
LG:  Bill Nagy (R)
  C:  Phil Costa
RG:  Kyle Kosier
RT:  Tyron Smith (R)

Yep that's right, not only are the Cowboys starting 3 first time starters, but only 1 offensive lineman is returning to the same position he played last year (of course after a 1-7 start and a 6-10 season that might not be a bad thing).  And of those 3 new starters 2 of them are rookies, with Nagy being a 7th round draft pick (yea I know this kind of stuff just does not happen much in the NFL).

So in a lockout shortened season, the Cowboys have taken one of the oldest, most experienced (I didn't say old and experienced was a good thing) offensive lines in the NFL and transformed it into one of the youngest; and if I wasn't to lazy to do the math I would be willing to bet that they are not only one of the youngest but also one of the most inexperienced (by number of starts) in the league.

Enough of how young and inexperience this offensive line is, lets look at how they performed in the "dress rehearsal" game against the Minnesota Vikings.  While I have no real scouting "skins on the wall" I think I am a pretty good judge of how guys look, I don't always know where a player is supposed to go, but I do know when he is beaten 1-on-1 or looks lost and cannot find anybody to block, and since my dad and grandfather were both lineman I grew up watching the guys in the trenches,. so here are my game notes on the Cowboys offensive line in bullet (I may need a bullet to watch this line, or maybe not) format:

- Left Tackle Doug Free looked amazing the entire first half, going against one of the best defensive ends in the game Jared Allen holding him to ZERO stats in the box score. And by my unofficial count Allen did not even register a Quarterback Pressure, heck I never saw him get within 5 yards of the quarterback! The money spent on him was money well spent. So at least quarterback Tony Romo's blindside appears to be safe, now if we can keep the pressure off him up the middle.......

-Left Guard Bill Nagy, where do I even start....Nearly every time Nagy was in pass protection in the first half he ended up 2-3 steps in the backfield, against the backups in the early part of the 3rd quarter he seemed to hold his own a little bit better.

• When Nagy was the pulling guard (twice) he had a full head of steam and was blown up in the hole both times by opposing linebackers, completely unable to move anybody out of the way and open, or even keep a running lane clear.
• Nagy seems to keep his arms/hands to low when blocking and lets them drop when not engaged.
• He seemed to struggle so much that it appeared he was getting a lot of help from the center and backs in the 2nd quarter.
• There was not a lot of positives on Nagy, he did get his guy on the ground one time (ok it was because the guy he was blocking tripped), and he picked up a couple of linebackers when they blitzed, seems to be smart and know the game, just not big or strong enough.

-With 2nd year undrafted free agent Phil Costa out with a sprained knee, undrafted rookie free agent (I am seeing a trend here) Kevin Kowalski played the entire game at center, and did a surprisingly good job. Most importantly there were no bad snaps between him and the quarterbacks, and I did not notice him getting abused by the Minnesota defense.

-Right Tackle, and much heralded 1st round draft pick Tyron Smith was very impressive. He obviously has great athleticism and used that to his advantage against Brian Robinson who repeatedly speed rushed him. Robinson constantly tried to get the edge on Smith who always kept him at a wide arc where he ended up 10+ yards in the backfield and well away from Romo. Twice though he was able to get to the quarterback by faking the speed rush and then spinning inside-Smith bit each time taking that first long step back and opening up his hips putting him out of position and off balance. It looked like it came down to a lack of concentration, thinking he knew what was coming every time.

• When Run Blocking Smith sometimes fails to get his head across the defender and loses control of him.
• Smith does an excellent job at what I call "Progression Run Blocking", once the first player he is blocking is out of the play, he moves onto the next(second) level and engages and takes out another defender.
• Smith was never given any help all night, left on an island and did very well, while I was down on him when the Cowboys drafted him, he has improved every preseason game that I have watched (which is all of them).

-Backup Guard, and 4th round pick David Arkin played very well, he has more hustle than anybody else on the field, and seems to play with a mean streak (which got him 1 ticky-tack late hit penalty).

• He made multiple very nice cut blocks on Vikings defensive lineman that took them out of the play, and twice they would have been in position to make the tackle if not for Arkin's cut blocks.

Well there is my quick analysis of the Cowboys offensive line, there will be a more detailed breakdown of the rest of the Cowboys team and the Vikings later on this week.  What do you guys think? Who else do you want to know about?

By the way the long touchdown pass from McNabb to Berrian was not as great as everyone says, Elam was in perfect position to pick it off, he just slightly mistimed his jump, 9 times out of 10 that pass is intercepted (it was underthrown).

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