Was the Dallas Cowboys Offensive Line Better than the Giants’ in 2011?
By cowgirlcas
As good as the Dallas Cowboys looked beating the New York Giants, the team still has weaknesses. Cowboys’ Owner and GM Jerry Jones has been signing big name players at the skill positions for years, rather than focusing on the linemen. Jerry Jones doesn’t seem to understand, like the average fan, that most football games are won in the trenches. So I wasn’t that surprised when I read the following tweet from Blogging The Boys:
"“Bad O-lines don’t keep teams from going to SBs anymore. Hell, Giants O-Line sucked last year except against DAL”"
I replied by explaining that “it all starts upfront” and that the Giants offensive line was far superior to Dallas’ last season.
Throughout my conversation with BTB, they relied mainly on ProFootballFocus’ rating of the Giants O-Line as being 32nd in pass blocking and 27th in run blocking. What many football enthusiasts don’t quite understand, is the guys who publish these web sites are not professional scouts, coaches, or even former professional players. They are every day people like you and me. Opinion and lack of training in properly evaluating players plays a major role in how they (mis)grade them. The guys at PFF do interesting stuff, but some of their grades and ranking are shocking – last season TE Martellus Bennett had a higher overall rating than Jason Witten.
The question is: how do they arrive at these totals? In order to determine how accurate these rankings are, we need to examine the raw data. Keep in mind, the debate was that the NYG didn’t have a better offensive line than the Dallas Cowboys last year. I will include the data from the 2011 season. All Stats are courtesy of the NFL.
Dallas Cowboys
| Team Statistics | ||
| Cowboys | Opponents | |
| TOTAL FIRST DOWNS | 327 | 305 |
| FIRST DOWNS (Rushing-passing-by penalty) | 91 – 219 – 17 | 78 – 199 – 28 |
| THIRD DOWN CONVERSIONS | 78/198 | 81/204 |
| FOURTH DOWN CONVERSIONS | 5/10 | 4/11 |
| TOTAL OFFENSIVE YARDS | 6008 | 5491 |
| OFFENSE (Plays-Average Yards) | 1017 – 5.9 | 972 – 5.6 |
| TOTAL RUSHING YARDS | 1807 | 1585 |
| RUSHING (Plays-Average Yards) | 408 – 4.4 | 385 – 4.1 |
| TOTAL PASSING YARDS | 4201 | 3906 |
| PASSING (Comp-Att-Int-Avg) | 376 – 570 – 12 – 7.8 | 336 – 545 – 15 – 7.6 |
| SACKS/HITS-Tony Romo | 36 – 81 | 39 |
| FIELD GOALS | 32/37 | 26/33 |
| TOUCHDOWNS | 39 | 38 |
| (Rushing-Passing-Returns-Defensive) | 5 – 33 – 0 – 1 | 10 – 24 – 0 – 4 |
| TIME OF POSSESSION | 31:24 | 29:33 |
| TURNOVER RATIO | +4 |
New York Giants
| Team Statistics | ||
| Giants | Opponents | |
| TOTAL FIRST DOWNS | 331 | 338 |
| FIRST DOWNS (Rushing-passing-by penalty) | 84 – 216 – 31 | 103 – 210 – 25 |
| THIRD DOWN CONVERSIONS | 77/206 | 84/220 |
| FOURTH DOWN CONVERSIONS | 4/13 | 10/18 |
| TOTAL OFFENSIVE YARDS | 6161 | 6022 |
| OFFENSE (Plays-Average Yards) | 1028 – 6.0 | 1072 – 5.6 |
| TOTAL RUSHING YARDS | 1427 | 1940 |
| RUSHING (Plays-Average Yards) | 411 – 3.5 | 435 – 4.5 |
| TOTAL PASSING YARDS | 4734 | 4082 |
| PASSING (Comp-Att-Int-Avg) | 359 – 589 – 16 – 8.4 | 361 – 589 – 20 – 7.5 |
| SACKS/HITS-Eli Manning | 28 – 72 | 28 |
| FIELD GOALS | 19/24 | 25/31 |
| TOUCHDOWNS | 47 | 46 |
| (Rushing-Passing-Returns-Defensive) | 17 – 29 – 0 – 1 | 15 – 28 – 0 – 3 |
| TIME OF POSSESSION | 29:29 | 30:30 |
| TURNOVER RATIO | +7 |
According to the NFL: The New York Giants had the 7th ranked offensive line in the NFL in 2011. The Dallas Cowboys offensive line came in at 19th. You can see the totals here. The fact remains that Tony Romo is much better at avoiding the sack than Eli Manning is. He actually makes his offensive line appear better than it really is(which makes the ranking of 19th higher than it should be). If Romo was sacked 8 more times and hit 9 more times being more mobile, and the Cowboys only managed 5 rushing TDs compared to 17 rushing TDs by the Giants: how is it possible that the Giants didn’t have a better offensive line?
Thanks to BTB for giving me the idea of comparing the two O-Lines, I am always happy to find new reasons to show how bad this Cowboys offensive line was and is. It allows me the chance to highlight the obvious, that Jerry Jones has neglected the O-line for years, and the only reason they don’t look terrible on game day is because Tony Romo, the Magician, makes them look way better than they are. Romo has made this a good offense despite an anemic running game and a sub-par line for years. If Romo ever gets a solid offensive Line with even an average defense, they would win Super Bowls. With a solid O-Line, Romo could probably win a Super Bowl with Drew Pearson as his #1 WR.
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