By Randy Galloway
rgalloway@ star-telegram.com
Leftover memo to myself from last week:
"Thank Wade."
But getting around to it today is actually better timing than a week ago because we've now had the hindsight advantage of seeing Drew Brees slice and dice the Giants of New York on Monday night.
So what does that have to do with giving a thank-you shout out to the dearly departed former head coach of the Cowboys?
Hold on. I'm getting there.
During Wade Phillips 31/2 seasons as Jerry's handpicked associate at Valley Ranch, I didn't do much thanking, even in some good times. Honestly, I didn't do any thanking. I'm petty like that.
But now that Wade is back in his area of NFL expertise -- defensive coordinator -- he's getting deserved rave reviews for his work with the absolutely luckless Houston Texans, the best team in Texas until a quarterback wipeout happened over the last couple of weeks.
Wade, however, is also having a huge leftover impact on the Cowboys' current 7-4 record, good enough for a first-place lead in the NFC East going into December.
How so?
For reasons that still baffle me, the same players who eagerly and even angrily defended him to local critics, and the same players who gushed in describing their love for "coach," those players flat quit on him to start the 2010 season.
You know the dire details. Eight games were played -- half the season -- and the Cowboys managed to win one, and in the process lost the starting quarterback for the rest of the year with a broken collarbone.
All this gutless behavior came just a season after the Cowboys had actually won a playoff game under Wade.
But by the time training camp started this season in late July, I was bouncing the question off players and front office people:
"What happened? Why'd you quit on Wade?"
When a guy like Stephen Jones doesn't yell at you for even suggesting "quit," and when a guy like Jay Ratliff doesn't reach up, grab your neck and snap it like a twig, consider that a non-denial.
But as if by plan, the answer was generally the same:
"I don't think we quit. We just got too predictable on defense."
Anyway, with the record at 1-7, and after a total failure to even compete in a game at Green Bay, Jerry had to make a dreaded move. He fired Wade, and named Jason Garrett interim head coach.
Garrett was not really on trial because Jerry wanted him to be the next head coach. But if there was no response on the field to this change, then not even Jones could sell Red J as the future permanent replacement.
There was, of course, an immediate response, and the season took an upbeat turn.
Wade being fired gave Garrett a beautiful window to get done what he wanted to get done without the pressure of taking over cold to start a new season.
Wade's 1-7 start, however, had already doomed the Cowboys, who finished 6-10. And look here, a year later.
We are seeing a positive chain reaction to a 2010 team considered Super Bowl capable but was horsespit instead.
It's called the schedule.
From the beginning, this Cowboys schedule looked favorable. In an optimistic burst, I even predicted a 9-7 record, but then upgraded it to 10-6. There was much hooting at me from media pals.
But Tony Romo was coming back healthy, Garrett had already had the right kind of impact, Rob Ryan might be a defensive upgrade but, most of all, the schedule wasn't a killer.
Of course, once the NFL implemented changes to the scheduling, all divisional teams now play pretty much the same schedule. It's not the factor it once was when a last-place team played a last-place schedule; a third-place team played a third-place schedule, and so on.
Yet, there wasn't a 100 percent change in the league.
For two of the 16 games, first place plays first place, second-place team plays... OK, you know the drill.
For example, the two "different" teams the Cowboys played or will play are Detroit (already a mind-blowing loss) and Tampa Bay coming up Dec. 17.
By comparison, the Eagles' two games were Chicago and Atlanta, both losses. The Eagles, of course, have found a way to lose to everybody.
But then there are the Giants, now the Cowboys' main roadblock to a divisional title. And the difference in the two games, by the luck of the draw, is having a major say in what is happening in the East.
The Giants (playing a second-place schedule) just got walloped by the Saints on the road. Their bounce-back game will have to come against -- oh, my -- Green Bay at home on Sunday.
Imagine the Cowboys, and Ryan's secondary, against Brees and his receivers in New Orleans on Monday night, and then hosting Mr. Rodgers and his receivers on Sunday.
Rob would have come out of that meltdown situation with a flat top, and weighing in at about 150 pounds.
It's a stretch of schedule that for now has totally changed the course of the divisional race. But the two wild cards, starting back a week into November, were the Saints and the Packers. You could see it coming for the Giants, who were sitting at 6-2 a week into November, and have now lost three straight.
When the Cowboys quit on Wade a season ago, when 1-7 happened, when the coaching change happened, when a mere two games of scheduling put the Giants up against it, well...
The Cowboys have proved nothing yet, except they survived an easy November of scheduling by winning four straight, with another road sweat expected Sunday against a bad Arizona outfit.
But that 1-7 disgrace a year ago is now having a helpful impact.
Thanks, Wade. No, seriously. Thanks.
Read more: http://www.star-telegram.com/2011/11/30/3562257/thank-you-wade-phillips-seriously.html#ixzz1fIEjhLxG
rgalloway@ star-telegram.com
Leftover memo to myself from last week:
"Thank Wade."
But getting around to it today is actually better timing than a week ago because we've now had the hindsight advantage of seeing Drew Brees slice and dice the Giants of New York on Monday night.
So what does that have to do with giving a thank-you shout out to the dearly departed former head coach of the Cowboys?
Hold on. I'm getting there.
During Wade Phillips 31/2 seasons as Jerry's handpicked associate at Valley Ranch, I didn't do much thanking, even in some good times. Honestly, I didn't do any thanking. I'm petty like that.
But now that Wade is back in his area of NFL expertise -- defensive coordinator -- he's getting deserved rave reviews for his work with the absolutely luckless Houston Texans, the best team in Texas until a quarterback wipeout happened over the last couple of weeks.
Wade, however, is also having a huge leftover impact on the Cowboys' current 7-4 record, good enough for a first-place lead in the NFC East going into December.
How so?
For reasons that still baffle me, the same players who eagerly and even angrily defended him to local critics, and the same players who gushed in describing their love for "coach," those players flat quit on him to start the 2010 season.
You know the dire details. Eight games were played -- half the season -- and the Cowboys managed to win one, and in the process lost the starting quarterback for the rest of the year with a broken collarbone.
All this gutless behavior came just a season after the Cowboys had actually won a playoff game under Wade.
But by the time training camp started this season in late July, I was bouncing the question off players and front office people:
"What happened? Why'd you quit on Wade?"
When a guy like Stephen Jones doesn't yell at you for even suggesting "quit," and when a guy like Jay Ratliff doesn't reach up, grab your neck and snap it like a twig, consider that a non-denial.
But as if by plan, the answer was generally the same:
"I don't think we quit. We just got too predictable on defense."
Anyway, with the record at 1-7, and after a total failure to even compete in a game at Green Bay, Jerry had to make a dreaded move. He fired Wade, and named Jason Garrett interim head coach.
Garrett was not really on trial because Jerry wanted him to be the next head coach. But if there was no response on the field to this change, then not even Jones could sell Red J as the future permanent replacement.
There was, of course, an immediate response, and the season took an upbeat turn.
Wade being fired gave Garrett a beautiful window to get done what he wanted to get done without the pressure of taking over cold to start a new season.
Wade's 1-7 start, however, had already doomed the Cowboys, who finished 6-10. And look here, a year later.
We are seeing a positive chain reaction to a 2010 team considered Super Bowl capable but was horsespit instead.
It's called the schedule.
From the beginning, this Cowboys schedule looked favorable. In an optimistic burst, I even predicted a 9-7 record, but then upgraded it to 10-6. There was much hooting at me from media pals.
But Tony Romo was coming back healthy, Garrett had already had the right kind of impact, Rob Ryan might be a defensive upgrade but, most of all, the schedule wasn't a killer.
Of course, once the NFL implemented changes to the scheduling, all divisional teams now play pretty much the same schedule. It's not the factor it once was when a last-place team played a last-place schedule; a third-place team played a third-place schedule, and so on.
Yet, there wasn't a 100 percent change in the league.
For two of the 16 games, first place plays first place, second-place team plays... OK, you know the drill.
For example, the two "different" teams the Cowboys played or will play are Detroit (already a mind-blowing loss) and Tampa Bay coming up Dec. 17.
By comparison, the Eagles' two games were Chicago and Atlanta, both losses. The Eagles, of course, have found a way to lose to everybody.
But then there are the Giants, now the Cowboys' main roadblock to a divisional title. And the difference in the two games, by the luck of the draw, is having a major say in what is happening in the East.
The Giants (playing a second-place schedule) just got walloped by the Saints on the road. Their bounce-back game will have to come against -- oh, my -- Green Bay at home on Sunday.
Imagine the Cowboys, and Ryan's secondary, against Brees and his receivers in New Orleans on Monday night, and then hosting Mr. Rodgers and his receivers on Sunday.
Rob would have come out of that meltdown situation with a flat top, and weighing in at about 150 pounds.
It's a stretch of schedule that for now has totally changed the course of the divisional race. But the two wild cards, starting back a week into November, were the Saints and the Packers. You could see it coming for the Giants, who were sitting at 6-2 a week into November, and have now lost three straight.
When the Cowboys quit on Wade a season ago, when 1-7 happened, when the coaching change happened, when a mere two games of scheduling put the Giants up against it, well...
The Cowboys have proved nothing yet, except they survived an easy November of scheduling by winning four straight, with another road sweat expected Sunday against a bad Arizona outfit.
But that 1-7 disgrace a year ago is now having a helpful impact.
Thanks, Wade. No, seriously. Thanks.
Read more: http://www.star-telegram.com/2011/11/30/3562257/thank-you-wade-phillips-seriously.html#ixzz1fIEjhLxG
B in the 3-4 this year. He did well.