We arrived here in Oxnard around 11 AM waiting with great anticipation to get eyes on the Cowboys practice. Here’s the news and the takeaways from Tuesday’s practice.
There was a scary moment towards the end of practice, the type that can ruin the whole day. Tyrone Crawford went down on a hustle play downfield. He wasn’t getting up and had to be carted off the field. They were looking at his leg or ankle and he was in serious pain. Learning here this evening that while not the dreaded high ankle sprain, it’s still pretty serious. They are anticipating ligament tears in there and that will keep him out at least a few weeks.
On the good side of the ledger, Tapper dressed out but didn’t do more than individual work that I saw. Anthony Brown was on the cords so that tells us he’ll probably be back practicing next week. Drove 120 miles to see Jaylon Smith for myself, but no action for him today. There’s no doubt he stands out amongst the LB corp, the young man has serious size to him.
A couple of guys stood out for me today. The first has to be Kavon Frazier who picked one off of Moore. It appeared that he may have gotten a hand on the ball, went up and he spun to locate the ball and had a nice return to go with it. On that play, Taco captured the edge on the left tackle (not #77) and easily had the sack, but Moore fired while under pressure and Frazier did his thing. A few plays later, Taco jumped offsides and granted it was a free play but Frazier made another pick. Nullified sadly by the off sides, but he was in position and did what you’d like to expect.
The crowd pleasing play of the day was a little bubble screen to Beasley, who waited patiently for the big fellas to clear the road for him. From there Cole picked his way around and thru the trash for probably 30 yards. Rod Smith had another excellent run as he took the handoff and he hit the hole going left and he put up six points for his effort.
Maliek Collins was giving Zak Martin a days workout as he was being disruptive with his pressure. Good to see him back in action. Still see him as our best DL and expect a very good year for him. Chido had a nice PBU in the red zone.
I didn’t feel that Dak or Moore were particularly sharp today. Dak had to wait longer than he’d like for someone to come open on several occasions. Not terrible when you settle for a check down and the recipient is #21, its really not a bad option. Dak had to scramble a few times and wasn’t able to connect as we’ve grown to expect. Dak did find Witten down the seam for a nice TD in the red zone. Remember this is practice, they’re trying things and getting their timing down. What I appreciated was after a miss, Dak & the WR discussed the play right then and there!
Interesting to watch the intensity with which Rod Marinelli works with the DL. He may be the DC, but he spends his time fully with the DL. Watched for ten minutes as he worked with D Lawrence. Very interesting how he had him working on his power moves whether an inside or outside rush. Really worked on his leverage and leg drive. Never saw that taught this particular way using the goal post pylon.
We all saw the game the other night and we were getting ripped up on defense. With the likes of Hitchens and Lee in coverage they were doing their part to make things on Dak. They’re depths were good and the windows were pretty tight based on how long he was holding the ball.
Zeke is so smooth in his reps! Never really puts in it high gear but you can see him reading his blocks with patience then showing his burst.
Ho hum, Dan Bailey was just money, he must have been 7 for 7 by my count, from 40 to 50 yards out.
Hopefully tomorrow we get to see Tapper get into some real action and we’d like to think tomorrow that Jaylon will get some serious work. You can see he’s itching to get out there!
P.S. My thanks to Cafe Amri for Internet services that allowed me to post this for you! Sadly my fears were confirmed that the Hilton’s Internet wouldn’t be able to handle the website editor!
