Dallas Cowboys: Rod Marinelli’s Unpredictability Helping Dallas Defense

The Dallas Cowboys creativity and sudden unpredictability make up for their overall lack of talent on defense.

The Dallas Cowboys aren’t exactly loaded with talent on defense. A combination of talent misevaluation, character issues, and poor investments have left the cupboards bare these days. But with newly realized Super Bowl expectations afoot, the pressure is on the Cowboys’ biggest weakness to become championship caliber.

Luckily for the Dallas Cowboys, they have Rod Marinelli.

Rod Marinelli, the Cowboys well-seasoned defensive coordinator, makes nearly every player better. Everywhere he’s been, players have responded to him and played to their peak ability.

He’s a master of motivation, a skilled teacher, and even a little bit unpredictable. Don’t worry, he’s not Rob Ryan level of “unpredictable”. Ryan, who coached the Dallas Cowboys defense before the Kiffin/Marinelli reconstruction, was so unpredictable, even his own team had no idea what was going on.

Marinelli has a way of simplifying things without being too simple. Famous for his Super Bowl winning Tampa 2 defense, Rod Marinelli has evolved over the years. Like other Monte Kiffin disciples, Marinelli employs a variety of looks spun off of that somewhat conservative approach.

Marinelli plays the percentages and makes opponents work for their points. As one of the NFL’s most conservative blitzers, Marinelli has made a living slowing opponents and waiting for them to make the mistakes.

The Evolution

But this season, the Cowboys are mixing things up ever so slightly. They have once again employed an aggressive 1-gap attack that relies mostly on front-four pressure. But they are also showing a variety of looks week-to-week from both a pass-rush perspective as well as a coverage perspective.

Against the Pittsburgh Steelers and Washington Redskins, the Dallas Cowboys often times only rushed three men. They decided to dedicate their extra man to the secondary and make the windows in which to throw, a little tighter. Things didn’t work out perfectly as Ben Roethlisberger and Kirk Cousins had their way with the secondary, but the Dallas Cowboys still managed to walk away victors and did so in unique fashion.

On Thursday, the Cowboys mixed it up again and dialed up the blitz. They rushed four, five, and even six players at the battered Vikings line. The blitzing didn’t yield a ton of tangible results by itself, but it caused the Vikings attack to pause at the unpredictability.

Rod Marinelli doesn’t blitz often, so when he does, it’s surprising. The Dallas Cowboys went from a pair of games where they essentially gave up on rushing the passer, to Thursday’s game where they attacked a variety of ways.

The defense attacked with the base four, they blitzed extra attackers, they zone blitzed (dropping a lineman back), and they faked blitzed (faking with defensive backs). And they ran a variety of games, twisting and stunting their way to the quarterback. It was a thing to behold and truly unpredictable based off of everything we’ve seen to-date.

You don’t have to be exotic like Rob Ryan to build a strong defense. You simply need to be able to execute and be unpredictable enough to make opposing offenses unsure. And that is what Rod Marinelli and his merry band of misfits are succeeding in doing.

Next: Plenty of Work Remains for the Dallas Cowboys

The unpredictability of the Dallas Cowboys defense is making up for the deficiency in talent. Rod Marinelli needs to continue to find knew ways of keeping opponents off balance – the postseason requires it.

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