Bag of Footballs - Mar 20 - DeMarcus Ware Retires

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/Staff Photographer

Dallas Cowboys defensive end DeMarcus Ware (94) pounces on Denver Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning (18) after dropping to the ground on the next to last play of the game at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Sunday, October 6, 2013. The Cowboys lost on a last second field goal to Denver 51-48. (Tom Fox/The Dallas Morning News)

By Bob Sturm, Special contributor Contact Bob Sturmon Twitter:@SportsSturm

You know who you are. You know if this applies to you. If it doesn't, you know the guy who needs to read this. Make sure he gets the link this morning.

 

This nonsense must end. I know people say mean things when they feel cornered or hurt. I understand how we rationalize things in our head to morph into the truth -- even if it is nonsense. It is how we sleep through the night. It is how we cope.  I get it. Nobody wants to follow the team that loses. Everyone wants to follow the champ. 

In these parts, it has been over two decades of barren land since the dynasty. It has been a rough go of things and therefore, the Cowboys fan can act out in anger. They can play the blame game. That is actually a reasonable position if you want to direct it at the top. Incompetence has hurt this thing from the decision makers for far too long. Maybe they are figuring it out, but that doesn't erase 20-some seasons of poor work.

But, this goes out to all of you with tepid reviews of the work of DeMarcus Ware. I expect Cowboys fans to minimize the accomplishments of Eli Manning or Brian Dawkins or Aaron Rodgers or whatever rival you wish to argue about. But, Ware? How did Ware get on your bad side? He left? The Cowboys cut him, you might recall, after the 2013 season. He was owed a ton of money, the Cowboys low-balled him after another 8-8 season, and off he went to play for Denver. It worked out for him, but around here, there was a group of Cowboys fans who were pretty loudly chipping away at his legacy.

Actually, if memory serves, he was being minimized long before that. When he was still a Cowboy, I would hear from you who wondered what he had ever done. You know, besides being the best at his position in the entire league from 2005 until his career ended.  

The Dude: Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man.

No. It isn't. That is a fact. He had 138.5 sacks over that run and nobody else was within 11. Jared Allen was at 127. Julius Peppers had 113.5 and Robert Mathis had 109 for the only players with 100. Ware was well above them all. And, no, there aren't too many Super Bowl rings there, right?

You know, because nobody ever said a defensive end was going to carry a team to a Super Bowl. They would do their part, but they aren't great at playing QB.  

He won a Super Bowl. Had 2 sacks in Denver's win over Carolina. Also, not an opinion. Here they are:

And, 

That capped off his career. And man, was it a good one. Unqualified greatness, right?

Wrong. The emails and tweets roll in from supposed Cowboys fans. The same who  will defend Romo's career to the death, because, you know, he never had a great team around him. So, you can't ask Romo to put up team accomplishments. But, wow, those individual ones.

I'm sorry. What does that even mean? A QB isn't held responsible for Jerry's silliness, but a DE is? 

Let's hear this obnoxious rationale. 

"Well, Bob, he never got big sacks. He never did much in the 4th quarter."

Wrong.

DeMarcus Ware sacks by quarter: 1st Q - 34.5; 2nd Q - 40.5; 3rd Q - 25; 4th Q - 38.5. It appears he had quite a few sacks in the 4th quarter.  

In fact, in Ware's career, no player in the sport had more sacks in the 4th quarter than DeMarcus Ware. In the entire sport.  

But, yeah, keep telling yourself that he disappeared at the end of games. 

"Well, Bob, his sacks were on early downs. Not the important ones."

Right. Well, you might have me on this one. Over his career on 3rd downs, he actually finished 2nd in the entire sport. One sack behind Elvis Dumervil on 3rd down, 52-51.  Second in the NFL.  

I suppose that will have to do.  

The Dude: Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man.

Not really. Ware needs nobody to defend him. But, in this day of the hot take and the undefended positions, someone must simply offer the eyeball test.  

He was the greatest Cowboy I have ever covered and the greatest pass rusher of his generation. He is a 1st ballot hall of famer and most likely a rubber stamp ring-of-honor guy. 

But, you keep telling yourself that he was "always injured."  

Actually, he missed 3 starts as a Cowboy. Or, roughly, 40 fewer than Romo. He wasn't always injured. But, he played through a shoulder injury that caused most to declare he was finished - when he clearly was not.  

Cap hell claimed a victim. And it was the greatest Cowboy since the Triplets.

The Dude: Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man.

Ok. That one really was just my opinion.

But, these sacks from his final season in Dallas are real.

Kansas City tried to fool him on the bootleg.  He wasn't having it.

Nobody closed down in the pocket like he did.

Have mercy on these poor Rams.  

Think a good thought for Jake Long and his family after that.

And now a few from his first year in Denver. He had a hat-trick against the great Joe Staley. I much enjoyed them:

That wasn't the fake-spin move on Staley. Just the one that set it up.  People forget he got a sack on that one, too.

There is the beauty. Wow. Watch it a dozen times.

And if you are going to get two, you might as well get three.

Forgive me if I sound defensive, but I have been around long enough to see people trash Alex Rodriguez, Derian Hatcher and Steve Nash when they left. I have seen people rationalize nearly ever great athlete who has rolled through town as "not that great" when they left.  

They all have their own stories and their own verdicts. I am not here to defend them.

And frankly, I never imagined we would live in a world where I would need to defend the greatest pass rusher of this generation.

But, here I am. He was best at getting to the QB in every category and every situation. And if there aren't enough "big" sacks in Dallas, it was because his organization betrayed him. You are smart enough to see that with the QB, but for some reason, a big group acts like Ware should have won more games by himself.

Don't turn on the diamond who was surrounded by the cow poo-poo.  He was brilliant and deserves unanimous adoration among his home market.  

Again, I realize it is only 5 percent of you that require this reminder, but there you go. I just spent the morning defending someone who needs no defense.  

Unqualified greatness.  What a career. 

2017 DRAFT DIGEST - WEEK 6 - LINEBACKERS

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AP

Wisconsin linebacker T.J. Watt runs a drill at the NFL football scouting combine, Sunday, March 5, 2017, in Indianapolis. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

By Bob Sturm, Special contributor Contact Bob Sturmon Twitter:@SportsSturm

NFL DRAFT DIGEST - WEEK 6

 

We will get to five talented defensive dudes below....

By now, hopefully you are up to speed on the weekly draft project to make sure we are familiar with all of the talented players who will be taken in the top two rounds in April's draft. It would be better if we had a little more time, because I already feel like getting to everyone is going to be a long shot, but here are prospects 26-30 (in terms of my random examination - not their quality by any stretch), so I imagine we will only be able to get to 50-60 names in all since today is St. Patrick's Day and I average five players a week.  

We are only 41 days from the draft - so if we hurry, I can maybe get 30 more names under the bell. It all ticks by very fast.

As you also hopefully know, I am really stressing defense this year. I fully realize that the Cowboys were looking WR/TE in the first few rounds when I started this project - which was sort of solved by keeping Terrance Williams for about 12 hours before Doug Free retired. Now, if you told me they would grab a right tackle at #28 or #60, that might seem plausible, too.  

That said, with three starters from the secondary gone, Jaylon Smith still a question, and the team obsessing over finding a war-daddy, I have decided to go 40-deep on defensive prospects and risk only getting 10-20 on offense. Sometimes, you have to make tough choices.

Here are the weeks already completed: 

- Week 1: (not ranked, just random top-50 prospects) in Missouri's Charles Harris, Tennessee's Derek Barnett, Auburn's Carl Lawson, Michigan's Taco Charlton and UCLA's Takkarist McKinley. 

- Week 2: Texas A&M's Myles Garrett, Illinois' Dawuane Smoot, Florida State's DeMarcus Walker, Alabama's Tim Williams and Stanford's Solomon Thomas. 

- Week 3: Alabama's Jonathan Allen, Alabama's Ryan Anderson, Michigan State's Malik McDowell, Temple's Haason Reddick, and Ohio's Tarell Basham. 

- Week 4: Washington's Sidney Jones, Ohio State's Marshon Lattimore, Florida's Teez Tabor, LSU's TreDavious White, and Florida's Quincy Wilson. 

- Week 5: USC's Adoree Jackson, Michigan's Jourdan Lewis and Jabrill Peppers, Alabama's Marlon Humphrey, and Clemson's Cordrea Tankersley. 

And now, on to this group - Week 6: Alabama's Reuben Foster, Wisconsin's TJ Watt, Vanderbilt's Zack Cunningham, Youngstown State's Derek Rivers, and Florida's Jarrad Davis:

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Reuben Foster - LB, Alabama

6'1 - 228  

Stats last two years:  30 games | 188 tackles | 21 tackles for loss | 7 sacks | 11 passes broken up

Foster is another from the Alabama defensive machine that is widely talked about as a top-10 pick and a sideline-to-sideline monster who can anchor any defense.

POSITIVES:  This All-American plays the inside linebacker position with the ability to run like a safety but bang into bodies like a linebacker. He mirrors running backs with great ease when he lines up against the run and pass and has hips to handle the turn and go. He closes on the ball with ferocity and looks the part of all of those first-round Alabama LBs before him who played the similar spot - Hightower, Mosely, Rolando McClain. He covers plenty of ground and comes through on both the A-gap blitzes but more impressively, can put his hand in the dirt and display some uncommon edge-rushing ability for these run-and-hit LBs, similar to Jaylon Smith last year. He stands tall and handles shedding guards and centers quite well.  

CONCERNS: The biggest concern here - aside from the occasional off-field scrape - is that he plays on such a talented defense that he is not asked to perform some of the tasks of his fellow prospects. For instance, Foster almost always runs clean. This means he is allowed to mirror the RB with almost no contact. His defensive line is so good that we don't know much about his work in traffic or too many examples of shedding. He is always clean, which allows him to look his best. That will not go with him to the NFL. He also doesn't finish plays quite as much as you would expect as he goes in for the kill but will allow some to break through his effort and require help from mates to finish the play.  

Foster is really, really good. I am not sure I like him as much as the consensus appears to be, but there is no question he belongs in the Top 25 prospects.  

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Jarrad Davis - LB, Florida

6'2 - 238 

Stats last two years: 23 games | 158 tackles | 17 tackles for loss | 5.5 sacks | 8 PBU

Davis is another high-quality inside linebacker who has intangibles that suggest he is a fine candidate to run your defense in addition to the athleticism and ability to lead it.

POSITIVES: There are times when you look at Davis and wonder if this is Ray Lewis. He is a tackling machine who is eager at the snap to spring into action and looking to physically battle guards and jack up the guy in front of him. He brings a real load when he hits and those around him rave about his communication skills and knowledge of what he's seeing. He can blitz through the A-gaps with intent and get where he needs to go. He will physically challenge offensive linemen who are much bigger than him. He definitely is the definition of a brute-force linebacker.

CONCERNS: He has had some health issues that cause us to wonder if this is a position to spend too much on. I have always considered this the defensive version of RB in that the career span and the job description demonstrates how difficult it is to play this position in this style and have a long career. The way he plays and his health history suggest that he might be an injury concern. Also, compared to Reuben Foster, Zack Cunningham and Haason Reddick, Davis looks a bit more stiff and tight and therefore we wonder about his ability to man-cover a RB in the flat. This is more and more becoming a key part of the job at times, and even though he can go sideline to sideline, when it requires turn-and-go, he can be left in the dust.

Davis is an absolute dude. I like him a lot. Just not quite as much as a few others in the inside LB group.

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Zack Cunningham: LB, Vanderbilt

6'3 | 234 | 4.67 40 | 34 3/4 arms

Stats, last two years: 25 games | 228 tackles | 33 tackles for loss | 4.5 sacks | 6 forced fumbles - 6 PBU

Cunningham is a Butkus Award finalist and All0American who is a fantastic prospect and a player who excelled despite being on a team without a ton of additional talent.

POSITIVES: Cunningham appears to be the type of player who is perfect for the further evolution of football where you watch a guy and you aren't sure which position he fits best, but you realize he will fit great at any of them. He is a sideline-to-sideline guy, if you wish. He is an outside LB who has the arms and talent to play edge for you. And, you know, Vanderbilt would send him out to the slot to defend receivers and tight ends like a safety. Is he Kam Chancellor? Is he Erik Kendricks? He is very quick, very athletic and finds the ball-carrier before stopping the play with authority. His 4th-and-1 stop to win the Georgia game was his calling card, but he makes plays all game long.  

CONCERNS: The only legitimate concern here for me is that you are projecting a bit more and not seeing him surrounded by those who allow for more opportunities for splash plays. He also tackles high, which allows bowling-ball RBs to slip through at times. You would love just a little more bang in his hits, but beyond that, he is really impressive. His range will jump off the screen.

Cunningham is going to be a seek-and-destroy force on defense for a long, long time. He may end up being the best player from this group at the next level.  

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These next 2 are back to "edge rushers" and guys who could be those high-sack producers we have visited about for weeks...

Derek Rivers: LB, Youngstown State

6'4 | 248 | 4.61 40 | 32 3/4 arms 

Stats, last two years:  27 games | 110 tackles | 35 tackles for loss | 22 sacks

Rivers is the rare small-school prospect who is getting all sorts of positive reviews after showing well at the Senior Bowl and Combine as an elite athlete.  

POSITIVES: Rivers is a really athletic edge who has the short-space quickness that dazzles on the screen. He also has production that borders on insane when you consider he had over 90 plays behind the line of scrimmage while in college. He gets low and his pursuit is absurd. His opponents have no choice but to hold him at times. He is off-the-charts twitchy. He has some people seeing DeMarcus Ware with his athletic traits and his small-school beginnings. He has the ability to look the part very well when he gets the game going in his direction. He brings electricity and suddenness to the edge which usually translate well if the traits are special enough. And they appear to be.  

CONCERNS: The concern about Rivers is two-fold. Neither of these are deal-breakers at all, but they must be considered. 1) He is going up against very poor offensive linemen. He generally is lining up against the right tackle of these opponents and if Big 12 schools don't have two good tackles, you can imagine Northern Iowa doesn't, either. 2) He has very few moves most of the time. He has superior athleticism and that works at his level with a nice motor. The question is how well he can be taught moves that will be required where the tackles are very strong on Sundays. He is very interesting and may have a higher ceiling than most. That said, he may also have a lower floor than top-50 edge guys, so there is a gamble in trusting this tape.  

Rivers has great quality and when forced to choose, he might be your guy. But he comes with a slight reservation - which is common with players from his level.

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TJ Watt: LB, Wisconsin

6'4 | 252 | 4.69 40 | 33 1/8 arms 

Stats, last two years: 27 games | 71 tackles | 17 tackles for loss | 11.5 sacks | 28.5 explosives

Watt has been forever known as JJ's little brother, but he earned his own identity in the last year as a legitimate candidate for Round 1.

POSITIVES: You want an edge player who explodes over the line at the snap and attacks. This destroys run and pass plays alike and puts the offense into a defensive posture themselves. Watt does that so well with his ability to set the edge and close down plays. He can trouble left tackles with a pass-move array that uses power and quickness very well. He can destroy plays and he can also use his arms to just push a tackle back into the QB. He tested as an elite athlete and one of the best in this group. He is far from developed but the progress shown since September is just silly. He certainly is of interest by many teams at the moment.  

CONCERNS:  The biggest issue is that he was a TE/fullback just 18 months ago. That means he has so much to learn and there is not a massive sample size of his abilities. Despite that, you would not call his moves raw. You are trying to figure out what scheme he fits best in, but I believe I am comfortable with him in the Dallas scheme as an explosive edge element. His size might make you think more about a 3-4 OLB, as he was in college for the most part. There is also concern of adding too much value for his last name, but his brother had nothing to do with his tape or his combine performance - aside from DNA.

Watt looks the part and although he was not on the radar when this project began last summer, he is now comfortably in Round 1 discussions.  

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Next week, we get back to the defensive backs as the Cowboys are trying to replace about 2,700 snaps in their secondary. It is a good draft for it, so plenty of work to do.  

Weekly Bag of Footballs - Mar 13

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By Bob Sturm, Special contributor Contact Bob Sturmon Twitter:@SportsSturm

Sturm's Weekly Bag of Footballs - All of the Comings and Goings From The Star

 

On Mondays, this bag of footballs exists to catch you up on the affairs of the last few days from the perspective of the Dallas Cowboys during the offseason.  Some weeks that takes a few paragraphs before we move on to other matters.  Today, it will certainly require all of our space.  Because on this first Monday of the free agency season, there is no fewer than 15 Cowboys (coming or going) that must be discussed on some level. 

So, let's go.

When the season ended, we rolled through the 18 pending free agents that the Cowboys had coming up and pretty much concluded that regardless of how many exit, the Cowboys will figure it out and be fine.  We will continue to maintain that position, even right now where every headline makes us cringe just a bit.  Now, not included in that 18 was starting right tackle and veteran Doug Free.  And let's start there. 

Doug Free retiring on Day 3 of Free Agency is a very oddly timed announcement.  We knew there would come a time where Free would ride off on his lawn mower and decide he was not ready to continue anymore.  After all, he was now 33 years old and had already played 10 seasons for the Cowboys after being selected in the 4th round back in 2007.  He was the longest tenured Cowboy after Tony Romo, Jason Witten, and LP Ladouceur.  Only Zack Martin and Travis Frederick played more offensive snaps in 2016 than Free, who played 1,054 of them.  He was seldom thought in recent years as "elite", but he battled and was dependable in most cases.  This is a bit of a blow as now the team scrambles to fill those 1,000 snaps at what most consider the 2ndmost vital spot on the offensive line.    Why did he wait until March 11th to announce this?  Because if he said it earlier, I am pretty certain the team would have made right tackle a bigger priority.  Was he being asked to take a pay cut again and got annoyed?  We are left to wonder, and when you consider they just also lost their left guard, this could get tricky. 

Ah yes, the left guard.  Ron Leary, just signed a 4 year deal that averages $9m a year in Denver.  $20 million in guarantees for a guy who had a knee that left him completely undrafted in the 2012 draft altogether because his career will be cut short.  Great for him, but that is another massive body to replace.  La'el Collins will be able to handle one of those 2 spots, but which one?  I would figure before it is all said and done that Collins will end up at RT and someone like Jonathan Cooper will be grabbed to play guard.  However, Emmett Cleary or Chaz Green may get into the mix at camp.  I have very pessimistic views on Green - both health and technique - and was impressed with Cleary when he was needed in 2016, but for now, the Cowboys will have to demonstrate that they can "plug and play" around their 3 franchise cornerstones on the offensive line and proceed without issue.  I think Collins can be good (although he will need a contract in a year), but that other spot - possibly the very vital right tackle spot - may end up being a camp headache, because I don't think they can afford to go into the established tackle market with their budget.

Let's discuss a few more that got paid to leave.  Barry Church is another undrafted free agent who built up his value in Dallas and now gets his career's best payday by signing for 4 years and $26m (although we can not find the amount of guaranteed money yet).  I have always enjoyed Church's work and I think he was a very fine Cowboy on some overachieving defenses.  This simply adds another very high-use hole to fill where Church gave them 1,000 snaps on a regular basis and now will need to be replaced with competent play.  They were never going to pay him that here and he was wise to jump on the money when the Jaguars offered it.  I think this is a bit of a blow that I did not fully anticipate that level of interest.  His replacement is tough to fully see right now.  I assume Jeff Heath was playing center field already, but with Church gone, they were going to need another safety for those scores of plays where the Cowboys would put 3 safeties on the field.

Also gone is JJ Wilcox to Tampa Bay.  Wilcox is reportedly taking 2 years for "up to" $8.5m with the Buccaneers.  He never approached the promise from his 3rd round draft position, but he was plenty useful at times both as a plug-in on defense and as a special teams guy. 

One of the first to leave was Terrell McClain to Washington for a reported 4 years/$21 million.  Now, I am a very big fan of McClain's, especially after the way he started 2016 as arguably the best defender on the team for the first 4-5 weeks.  But, much like in 2015, he was nowhere close to staying as dominant for the course of a whole year, so Washington is utilizing a lot of faith that at nearly 30, McClain is going to suddenly run off 4 years of quality play.  They were scrambling to find a player like the exceptional Chris Baker (who they are losing) and I don't believe they did so.  McClain is quite a nice piece at the right price, but there was no way you can consider that for a part-time 1-technique. 

Finally, amongst the exits, you have Jack Crawford joining that ensemble cast in Atlanta's defensive front on a 3-year deal that is at $10m.  Again, we are not sure the guarantees, but for yet another Cowboys find on the scrap heap from Oakland, this is a very nice payday and he had to take it.  All of these guys are getting the biggest paydays of their career and have to be delighted to have their hard work pay off.  Crawford never sustained much consistency, but he would certainly flash and caught someone else's eye.

Meanwhile, if you would have told me that Terrell McClain was going to get better offers than Terrance Williams, I would have thought you were nuts.  Of course, when the Cowboys got Williams to stay with them for the bargain price of 4/$17m, some readers went nuts the other way.  I don't totally get how anyone could be anything but ecstatic to keep a starter at this price, but some of you were looking forward for him being somewhere else, I guess.  For me, I was pretty sure they were going to lose him for about $6-$7m annually, because that is the going rate.  If you look at receivers of a similar production value and similar draft spot/age, you see that Atlanta's Mohamed Sanu (5/$32.5m), San Diego's Keenan Allen (4/$45m), Miami's Kenny Stills (4/$31m)and Buffalo's Robert Woods (5/$39m) set the market pretty high.  Production-wise, Williams can hang with those guys, but his soft market allowed the Cowboys to keep him around.  If I am a fan, I am thrilled with this, but like I said, the feedback has not been favorable. I guess many didn't want him at any price. 

Then, Brice Butler was kept on 1/$1.1m for this season.  So, you actually kept both of them for less than $20m which I never thought possible.  Pretty good business there from the Cowboys to keep their offensive skill players situation in a great spot without having to burn a 2nd or 3rdon a wide receiver.

A couple new additions as well.  Philadelphia's Nolan Carroll and former Bears pick Stephen Paea have both been added.  Carroll on a 3/$10m deal - identical to Jack Crawford's and Paea looks like 1 year for $2m.  Both have been useful pieces, but Carroll is a low-end starter who I have never cared for and Paea is likely just cover for Terrell McClain's exit.  I assume they still plan on drafting a corner and maybe trying to retain Brandon Carr or Morris Claiborne if the market gives them nothing but frowns.  We will give Carroll a closer look soon, but with the division adding huge receivers in every city (Brandon Marshall, Terrell Pryor, Alshon Jeffrey), the Cowboys are likely fretting about the caliber of their secondary at the moment.  Unfortunately, that is a very expensive place to fill vacancies this time of year.  And the Cowboys have almost no money.

Oh yes, and they took a flier on Aggie DE Damontre Moore who has not really approached his expectation level and with his DUI over the holidays, he might be facing a suspension from the league.  Add him to the pass rush mix at camp, at least.

Which ends this space with Tony Romo.  Romo has a week of rumors, heresay, and instagram that has allowed everyone to say whatever they wanted to say about the Cowboys QB.  In the end, we are right where we started with nothing but uncertainty on why the Cowboys are continuing to hold out for a trade that I don't believe they can afford.  I have said since November that a release is the only way to do this, but apparently, someone (Jerry Jones) disagrees with me and holds out hope that he will be able to get a good trade still.  He might be right, so let's wait and see if he wins another hand of poker, but for now, it all seems like a really transparent and somewhat silly bluff. 

But, I believe those comings and goings should get you caught up on everything the Cowboys have done since the window opened.  In total, there is plenty of work to be done and plenty of time to do it.  Just wondering about the cash to pull it all off.