Green Bay Packers: 5 Things to Know About the Cowboys

What is your biggest concern four games into the season?

Reid: Play selection on early downs. Is Dallas the archaic offense from last year that runs the ball on early downs and aims for “manageable” 3rd downs, or are they the team we saw in Weeks 1-3 that was in the NFL’s top-5 in early-down passing? While I’m hopeful the old run-run-pass model was retired when Kellen Moore came on board, but Sunday’s gameplan in New Orleans is cause for concern.

Against the Saints, Dallas ran the ball far too often on early downs (only 2 of 11 were successful runs) and they seemingly abandoned their highly successful play-action passing approach.  This week against the Packers will be interesting since Green Bay’s run defense appears to be their primary weakness. Will the Cowboys attack the perceived weakness or will they go with what the analytics say and attack through the air? Reverting to the 2018 Cowboys is the biggest concern. We need to see early-down play-action.

Takeaway: Based on the last few weeks, I’m expecting Dallas to run Zeke right at this Packers’ defense until they prove that they can slow him down. With Tyron Smith out at LT, if Dallas does try to throw the ball more, I feel that plays into the hands of this Green Bay defense as I mentioned previously. So of the two options, I’d rather see the Cowboys try to move the ball through the air, but I won’t get my hopes up.