SB Nation User Blog: Scoobay

Protection coming for defensive players

Scoobay — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 14:12:02 -0000

Protection coming for defensive players

Article about the new "Hines Ward" rule and other potential changes made in rules.

A few months ago, when then-Baltimore Ravens linebacker Bart Scott was recounting all of the fines that had been levied against defensive players in the 2008 season, he turned his ire to the NFL at large.

"Look at the rules," said Scott, now a member of the New York Jets. "It’s garbage. You can’t touch this offensive player after five yards [beyond the line of scrimmage]. You can’t hit any of them in the head. You can’t hit this one below the knee. You can’t hit this one if he’s supposedly defenseless. You can’t hit them away from the ball. Everything is designed to protect [the] offense. The [NFL] could care less about defensive players. Was anyone out there saying ‘Oh boy, we need to protect [Cincinnati Bengals linebacker Keith Rivers] when he got his jaw broke and never saw [the hit] coming?’ No. People were all like ‘Oh, that’s tough play.’ Maybe if you are going to protect supposedly defenseless offensive guys, you should protect defenseless defensive players, too."

Miles Austin Highlights from the Bolts game. Someone over at RanchReport compiled this so i'm just...

Scoobay — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 20:33:37 -0000

http://www.4shared.com/file/58786233/934b30c4/Miles_Austin_Highlight_qt2.html

Miles Austin Highlights from the Bolts game. Someone over at RanchReport compiled this so i'm just linking to the video.

2nd year players

Scoobay — Mon, 19 May 2008 13:01:31 -0000

It's been discussed over and over again, but not more recently due to the excitement of bringing in new talent through the draft. But what about yesterday's song, the sophomores who are returning this year? Perhaps more than the rookies, they have the potential to improve our already good team since they have a year of experience under their belt, have had some playing time, and are practicing regularly against our pro-bowl laden squad of talent. Time will tell but it's time for them to start producing...

While we're on the subject, can anyone think of recent players who have had their breakout season in their 2nd year? Do we really need to wait until the 3rd year to see some fruit?

For purposes of this poll, I decided to include Tank Johnson who of course is not a 2nd year player, but it'll be his 2nd year with the Cowboys. I didn't include Ken Hamlin who has for all intents and purposes 'broken out' already. Same for Nick Folk.

Poll

Which 2nd year player will have a breakout year?

Deon Anderson

24 votes

Alan Ball

2 votes

Courtney Brown

2 votes

Doug Free

1 votes

Tank Johnson

24 votes

Anthony Spencer

55 votes

Isaiah Stanback

41 votes

149 votes | Poll has closed

Ware a Scheme Buster

Scoobay — Wed, 10 Oct 2007 22:43:36 -0000

Well how's that for getting some respect? ESPN has an article detailing different players in today's game that are notable for opposing teams needing to significantly alter their gameplan to stop them.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/column...

Towards the end of the article there's this nice little tidbit about our own D. Ware

"You know where Strahan is going to be," one AFC scout said, "but Ware changes the game when he plays down, plays up. Guys who play that position in that defense must be able to rush the passer and then turn their hips to cover and drop. Ware can do it all."

He really is a special player and gives us the chance to be great. Fortunate for us to have him and hopefully Spencer can turn into a similar type of player for us in the very near future. Hard to think of other Cowboy defensive players in recent memory who would have this distinction - would have to go back to Deion, Haley... uh, and then farther back to Randy White<?>

On offense, no question that we have a lot of difficult weapons to plan for - Romo, Witten, Owens... but hard to put our RB's in that category. Perhaps the argument for picking an elite RB has some merit...