Do The Cowboys Have Too Much Defensive Tackle Talent?

“Can you actually have too many elite defensive tackles—or is that the best problem in football?”On this episode of The Ben and Skin Show, Ben Rogers, Jeff “Skin” Wade, Kevin “KT” Turner, and Krystina Ray break down the Cowboys’ revamped defense after a dominant win over the Raiders. The crew debates whether Dallas now has an embarrassment of riches at defensive tackle and what that means for the team’s future.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Now is around the sports.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
Ktun Queens has.

Speaker 1 (00:07):
All the sports.

Speaker 3 (00:09):
Yes, I would say that the new Dallas Cowboys defense
looked pretty good for one night last night. It had
me thinking though about the future because they do have
Kenny Clark, they do have Quinna Williams you just traded
for and oh so diggi Zo will you draft a
couple of years ago and then you signed him to
an extension. And the way things looked last night against

(00:29):
the Bad Raiders' offensive line is not how it's gonna
look every single week. But it's pretty interesting to have
that position, a defensive tackle, a position where you haven't
had anyone really good in a long time.

Speaker 1 (00:42):
Now you have like.

Speaker 3 (00:43):
The ability to keep them fresh. You have all these
things you can do with the defense now. And I
was just wondering, do the Cowoys have too many good
defensive tackles now?

Speaker 4 (00:53):
I saw my show to tweet out the depth chart
last night that the Cowboys, you know, you know media
team gave the depress or whatever, and it had three
starting defensive tackles were listed.

Speaker 1 (01:06):
It's how they listed. It brought us.

Speaker 4 (01:07):
I saw brought us with a tweet that said he
counted four different five man line combinations, so they were
figuring out ways to get creative and get them all
in the mix. I didn't see the play breakdown of
how many you know plays each defensive tackle played, but man,
if your biggest issue is that you can't stop the run,
it just I mean, this is gonna be fun at

(01:28):
least the rest of the way this season to have
three of the best defensive tackles in this in the
entire league. I feel like Kenny Clark, I don't think
you can keep him next year because I think that's
a I think.

Speaker 1 (01:39):
He'll be the odd man out.

Speaker 4 (01:40):
That's a lot of money to pay him, and I
think they need to use their resources elsewhere to shore.
I mean, that's kind of an embarrassment of riches unless
you're gonna really switch to more of a three to four.

Speaker 1 (01:52):
But I I mean I based on.

Speaker 4 (01:54):
His age and what his contract is, I think they
probably will part ways with him next year, I.

Speaker 2 (01:58):
Would think, but you can't reach ructure him. I've been
thinking about this a lot, and I would love to
have him in Quinn Williams next each other, so you know,
when you go to the agent, he knows he's not
going to get that twenty five million dollar base next year,
and it doesn't impact the Cowboys at all to waive
him because they're not they're not on the hook for
anything because they're not the ones that sign him to

(02:19):
the signing bonus. And so if he likes being here,
you can you can structure a deal that's favorable, unless
they just want to completely go onto the open market,
which I get at his age he may want that.
But I think that there's ways to keep them both
and keep Ziggy I mean or oh see, I'm sorry, I.

Speaker 1 (02:38):
Will sign him. Yeah, I mean they're good, you know.

Speaker 3 (02:40):
Yeah, with Kenny Karktiff, if you cut him at any
point after this year, you would save in twenty twenty
six and twenty twenty seven about twenty million dollars a year. Yeah,
I'm just rounding there, But but you can over two
years you can restructure that though you don't even you know,
because once you cut him, you can still resign him.

Speaker 2 (03:02):
And if the agent knows you're gonna cut him anyways,
they're starting back at ground zero.

Speaker 4 (03:07):
I think you just got to You just paid Osa too,
so he's a top five paid defensive tackle in the sport. Also, uh,
it's just are you gonna go to a three four?
I don't know if can you afford to have, you know,
a top five defensive tackle as a backup and one
of the highest defensive you know, pies paid defensive tackles. Maybe,

(03:28):
I don't know. I mean, you should be able to
do much better against the run. But they have so
many other needs, you know, at this point, they still
need a linebacker help, they need a safety, They need
at least one corner. They still need a little help
on the edge too. I don't know how they can
address all of those things. Do you guys think James

(03:48):
is a player?

Speaker 1 (03:49):
James Houston? James not really, dude? He is? He flies?

Speaker 2 (03:54):
I mean, I know he's built like this, He's built
like Woodson, But man, I think he I think he
can play.

Speaker 3 (04:04):
I don't want to stay in this vortex too long,
but can I go into the nerd land for twenty seconds,
because I do have a little bit evidence that says
maybe the Cowboys should have maybe not done this trade,
which one, uh, the Quentin Williams trade, either trade, and
the reason is the Cowboys going into last night's game,
so no games with Quinn Williams. We're a top five
team and quick pressure rate rushing the passer from the

(04:26):
defensive tackle position top five. Okay, in quick pressures from
the defensive tackle position on non blitz plays, they are
the number two team in the league on non blitz
quick pressures in the defensive tackle position. Telling you that
Kenny Clark and OsO Dickie Zuela, we're actually getting the
job done against the pass. Against the run, I don't

(04:46):
think those numbers would hold up a sure. Quentin Williams
will really help you against the run. Don't know how
that's gonna go because the Raiders said, we're not gonna
run the ball tonight.

Speaker 1 (04:54):
Yeah, twenty six passes, four runs at halftime. Yeah, Joe
Kelly's like, I don't think we should run it.

Speaker 2 (05:00):
One of those runs was actually a quarterback scramble. It
wasn't a handoff.

Speaker 1 (05:03):
It's so weird.

Speaker 3 (05:05):
It's just weird seeing Pete Carroll and Chip Kelly involved.

Speaker 1 (05:09):
I wasn't you what are we even doing?

Speaker 2 (05:11):
Did y'all realize that he was the oldest coach in
the history of the NFL.

Speaker 1 (05:14):
No, I didn't either. You know, it's he is.

Speaker 2 (05:17):
He's always been kind of like an energetic, spry kind
of guy. So he doesn't really carry himself like seventy four.
But when you think about those really old coaches from
the past, people that were older back in the day
looked older than they were.

Speaker 1 (05:31):
You know what I'm saying. Just the rugged lifestyle. You know.
One of the things that couldn't help.

Speaker 4 (05:35):
But think about is you look at this Cowboys roster
and you try to figure out what they're going to.

Speaker 1 (05:39):
Do moving forward? Is do we still not know what
happened to Trevon Diggs.

Speaker 3 (05:43):
I've been asking that question for years. Well, I mean,
for like, seriously, we're a month from this happening. We
don't know what happened. He's crazy to me, he's for sure,
without a doubt, the most gone guy. No, there's no
way he's about Todd try to do the splits now
he tried to split It's crazy. All right.

Speaker 1 (06:03):
There you have it.

Speaker 4 (06:03):
There's part one of Around the Sports coming up in
three minutes. Part two of Around the Sports. Probably the
most famous guy we've ever had on our show, George W. Bush,
was on the Maning Cast last night. We have to
examine the audio. It's three minutes away. Don't miss it.