There are two very distinct tiers in the NFC East. At the top you have two teams with proven quarterbacks and proven rosters hoping to make a run to the playoffs, or even farther. At the bottom you have two teams still breaking in young quarterbacks on rosters that likely aren’t going anywhere even if everything goes right. It’s a two-team race at the top, and two other teams just hoping this season doesn’t set them back another five years.
Dallas Cowboys
Best Case Scenario
Dallas stumbled down the stretch a year ago, but I still see them as the favorites to win the NFC East in 2020. They have the best receiving corps in the division. They have the best running back in the division. They may even have the best offensive line in the division, though I’d probably give a slight edge to Philadelphia following the retirement of Travis Frederick. Most importantly, they have the best quarterback in the division. There are fair questions about their defense, but I’ll take offense over defense any day of the week, and right now the Cowboys are poised to have one of the best offenses in the NFL.
It will be interesting to see how they adjust to the changes in the coaching staff. Mike McCarthy had a poor reputation by the time he was ridden out of Green Bay, but in their first year without him the Packers offense wasn’t significantly improved, so maybe he wasn't the problem there. And he’s coming into a team that is keeping offensive coordinator Kellen Moore, a principle reason behind their offensive improvement last year. If they can keep things steady on that side, they just need a small step forward from a defense that has talent in place, and they should be able to finish out this year’s division title and set themselves up for deeper runs in later seasons.
Worst Case Scenario
As good as this offense was a year ago, there were also several games where they fell completely flat and looked like the vapid unit that failed to live up to their talent in prior seasons. Some of this can be explained away by inconsistency from their young offensive coordinator, but it’s still a concern headed into 2020. When they faced good defenses over the second half of 2019—Philadelphia, Buffalo, New England—they failed to reach 20 points, and ended up losing games that should have set them up for a division title.
The biggest change in this roster from a season ago is the loss of Byron Jones. They have handed out a bunch of big money contracts in the recent past, and because of this they couldn’t hold on to arguably the most important player on their defense. While their front seven still has plenty of useful players, their secondary has been cobbled together from cheap free agents and recent mid-round draft picks. These players are going to need to step up, or else the offense is going to have to be ready to score a lot of points week-in and week-out.
Player to Watch – Jourdan Lewis, CB
Lewis is a stand-in for the other young players in their secondary, and I picked him mostly because he has the highest upside of them. A fourth-year player out of Michigan, Lewis already has a lot of experience under his belt. He played the majority of Dallas’s defensive snaps in both 2017 and 2019, and he showed flashes of athleticism and attitude that will be useful facing off against opposing slot receivers and tight ends.
Dallas has plenty of experience in the secondary, just not much of it impressive. Anthony Brown and Chidobe Awuzie have both been regulars in the lineup since they were drafted in 2016 and 2017, but neither has emerged as the sort of player you can really count on. Xavier Woods is more reliable at safety, but they’re going to need him to pick up his game slightly as well. There is no single replacement for Jones, and every player in this secondary is going to have to bear a heavier burden in his absence.
Philadelphia Eagles
Best Case Scenario
Even entering his fifth season, Carson Wentz feels like a player who is just so close to putting it together. His statistics have been a rollercoaster throughout the early part of his career, but his level of play has been fairly consistent. He can make some excellent plays, but he also leaves opportunities on the field. A year ago he was hindered by a receiving corps that was battered to pieces, and they should be better this year, even if they don’t get much from raw rookie Jalen Reagor. If Wentz can find a way to pull together more consistency, he is absolutely capable of stealing the crown of best quarterback in the division from Dak Prescott.
Defensively this is mostly the same unit it’s been in the past. Fletcher Cox and Brandon Graham are still a terror up front. They could get more this season from Derek Barnett and Josh Sweat. The biggest changes have come in their secondary, where veteran presence Malcolm Jenkins is out and Darius Slay is in. Slay wasn’t great a year ago, but hopefully freed from Detroit he can bounce back to his former self. This defense has been held back by gaping holes in the secondary for years, and this could be the piece that pulls them together. I have Dallas ranked ahead of them in the division, but I think Philadelphia’s upside is higher, and if there’s a Super Bowl contender in this division, the Eagles are it.
Worst Case Scenario
The receiving corps is healthy now, but that doesn’t mean it will last. Alshon Jeffery has spent half his career on the injured list, and DeSean Jackson is 33 years old. Reagor will help with depth, but this team will likely still be leaning heavily on their tight ends and running backs in the passing game. They are good at those positions, but they don’t have the sort of superstars who can carry a passing attack.
Age is an issue on defense as well. Graham is 32, and both Cox and Slay will turn 30 during the season. A precipitous drop in their ability to get after the quarterback is not out of the question, particularly since the younger players I mentioned have yet to live up to their pre-draft expectations. If the Eagles can’t get after the quarterback, not even Slay can save this secondary. I think they are well-rounded enough to avoid a drop into the bottom ten of the league (having four games against the teams below doesn’t hurt either), but being in playoff contention is far from a sure thing.
Player to Watch – Dallas Goedert, TE
Philadelphia’s receivers may not be much to look at, but their tight ends are certainly impressive. Zach Ertz is a clear notch below the best of the league (Kittle, Kelce, and possibly Gronkowski, depending on his current condition), but he’s exactly the sort of matchup problem you want from your tight end. He’s big, he’s functionally mobile, and he is comfortable playing in traffic. He’s the sort of player that demands attention from the defense, and that very few teams have someone capable of dealing with.
Few teams have someone who can matchup with one good receiving tight end. No one has two such players. Which could be a problem, because the Eagles may have another version of Ertz sitting on the bench. Goedert is about the same size as Ertz, and prior to the draft he put up even better testing numbers. It took him a little while to adjust to the NFL after leaving South Dakota State, but he came on strong in his second season in 2019, recording 41 catches for 425 yards over the second half of the year. These two interchangeable tight ends could give Philadelphia a unique passing attack that few NFL defenses are equipped to handle.
New York Giants
Best Case Scenario
The Giants still have a tall hill to climb, but they’ve started taking steps, which is what elevates them above last place in this division. They have some good young players on both the offensive and defensive lines that should help stabilize those units. Saquon Barkley is a unique talent, and this could be the year he ascends to the elite tier of running backs in the NFL.
Daniel Jones was up and down as a rookie, but he was better than I expected and has the potential to grow headed into 2020. The decision by Nate Solder to opt out of the season hurts, but with fourth overall selection Andrew Thomas in the fold, this line should be able to keep him upright. And he has an intriguing stable of weapons to distribute the ball to, provided they stay healthier this year than they were in 2019. It won’t be enough to get them into playoff contention this year, but this is a team trending up, and ideally they’ll head into 2021 with even more optimism.
Worst Case Scenario
Jones’s statistics were not terrible a year ago, but his actual performance was worse than the numbers show. He put up big numbers beating up on mediocre teams like Washington, Detroit, and the Jets, with more than half of his touchdowns coming in those three games. When faced by a real defense, he was more or less helpless. He took sacks at a high rate, and he fumbled the ball an insane 18 times, losing 11 of them.
The way this team has gone about building itself has felt backwards over the past couple of years. They had three first round draft picks in 2019, and I hated all of them. The future of Jones is still up in the air, and while Dexter Lawrence could be a good player, his value is limited as a run-stuffing nose tackle, especially when they already had a quality option in Dalvin Tomlinson. And of course there was DeAndre Baker, who was abysmal last year even before an offseason arrest for armed robbery has him facing potential prison time. The future of this team will be built on that draft class, and right now it is not looking promising.
Player to Watch – Darius Slayton, WR
One pleasant surprise from a year ago was the emergence of the young receiver Slayton. As both Golden Tate and Sterling Shepard missed time with injuries, Slayton emerged as a truly dangerous deep threat in this offense. After essentially not playing in September, he finished the year with 740 yards and 8 touchdowns, showing both the speed to get down the field and the ability to make plays on balls in the air.
Slayton certainly has the talent to emerge as a quality starting receiver. He has good size at 6-1, and he dominated at the Combine, running a 4.39 forty and then leaping 40.5 inches in the vertical. He was a game breaker in college where he averaged over 20 yards per reception, and last year he showed signs of rounding out his game in the NFL. He has all the talent in the world, and it wouldn’t shock me if by the end of the year he had established himself as New York’s top receiving option.
Washington Football Team
Best Case Scenario
There’s been so much other shit going on with this team that it will actually be a relief once they make it onto the field. At least until we watch them play. This is a roster that is still very much under construction, and even in the best case scenario I struggle seeing them reaching even a .500 record.
That doesn’t mean the season is pointless. What Washington needs right now is forward momentum, and there are a few pieces that could give that to them. Dwayne Haskins struggled in his time as starter a year ago, but he looked better as the season went along, and I still like his long-term upside. He doesn’t have much to help him on this offense, but Terry McLaurin looked like a budding star a year ago. Any life from this offense is going to be an improvement over 2019, and it will set them up with something positive to look forward to in 2020.
Worst Case Scenario
Haskins still has potential, this defensive line is loaded with talent, and there are a few functional veterans dotting this roster. But for the most part, this team has nothing. They have gaping holes at two of the three levels of their defense. They have at most three functional offensive linemen, and only players on their roster with more than 400 career receiving yards are McLaurin, Adrian Peterson, Dontrelle Inman, and Richard Rodgers.
And if Haskins doesn’t take a step forward, this team is in deep, deep trouble. I don’t know how they are going to score points. Even before they were forced to cast aside Derrius Guice, they didn't have much going for them in the running game, behind a line that isn’t built to open consistent holes. And as good as their defensive line is, there’s only so much a pass rush can do when they have Sean Davis and Fabian Moreau starting behind them. This is a team set up for another top-five selection, and even after they get that I’m not sure how bright their future is.
Player to Watch – Matt Ioannidis, DE/DT
Chase Young is a future superstar, and I can’t fault any team for selecting him. But man, if there was one position Washington didn’t need, defensive line was it. They already had three former first round picks on their front, with solid defensive tackles Jonathan Allen and Da’Ron Payne as well as veteran edge rusher Ryan Kerrigan. And they even have a late round find in Ioannidis, who has 16 sacks over the past two years as part of a rotational pass rushing role.
I’m not sure I have ever seen a team as unbalanced as this one. They could very easily have the best defensive line in the NFL, and the worst everything else. They almost don’t have enough space to get all their talented pass rushers on the field at once. Hopefully they can still find a role for Ioannidis, because he is one of the most underappreciated players in the league, and on a very team-friendly deal that will keep him in Washington through 2022.
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