{"id":159855,"date":"2025-08-20T01:32:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-20T01:32:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/159855\/"},"modified":"2025-08-20T01:32:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-20T01:32:09","slug":"dallas-cowboys-physicality-is-evident-in-camp-practices-when-will-it-show-up-in-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/159855\/","title":{"rendered":"Dallas Cowboys\u2019 physicality is evident in camp practices. When will it show up in games?"},"content":{"rendered":"

FRISCO \u2014 Cowboys head coach Brian Schottenheimer<\/a> has made it clear that his expectations for his first head coaching job are high. He plans on winning. He plans on winning so much that he\u2019s already planning on how he\u2019ll handle losing his assistants to other teams. <\/p>\n

It would make sense then that his standard for the physicality of his team would be high, too. <\/p>\n

The Cowboys<\/a>, at least on Saturday, missed that mark. <\/p>\n

\u201cI talked to the guys about it this morning,\u201d Schottenheimer said on Monday. \u201cI said, \u2018At the end of the day, when one of your main four pillars you believe in is physicality, I thought the physical nature that we played with was not good enough. It was inconsistent. Does that mean we weren\u2019t physical at all? No. There were some guys that were very physical … but as a football team as a whole, we weren\u2019t physical enough. And that\u2019s coaches and players and all of us together.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Which is why Schottenheimer made a declaration prior to this week\u2019s two open practices.<\/a> <\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the day,\u201d Schottenheimer declared, \u201cI want these next two practices to be ass-kickers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cowboys owner Jerry Jones<\/a> alluded to that hope, as well. He spoke to the fans inside the Ford Center at The Star during Tuesday night\u2019s open practice and mentioned \u2014 in between one fan\u2019s call for him to sign Micah Parsons<\/a> \u2014 that it would be a hard, fully-padded practice for his team. <\/p>\n

He said, \u201cThey\u2019re really going to be busting their you know what to impress\u201d the fans in attendance. <\/p>\n

Related:What Jerry Jones said as players fight for Cowboys roster spots ahead of preseason finale<\/a><\/p>\n

What followed was a physical practice for preseason standards. There\u2019s a limit to how physical teams can be in practice. They aren\u2019t supposed to bring players to the ground. When they do, coaches will immediately spring onto the field and wave their hands up to signal to players and onlookers that players are supposed to stay on their feet.<\/p>\n

A physical hit, for practice terms, is more of a physical thud. Immediately, there were signs of those. Two of the most physical guys on the team, tight end Jake Ferguson and safety Donovan Wilson, collided on a play-action rollout on the first play of 11-on-11. Wilson had an aggressive run fit on the next play for what would\u2019ve been a tackle for loss. Safety Malik Hooker had a forced fumble on rookie Rivaldo Fairweather and a recovery for what would\u2019ve been a defensive touchdown. <\/p>\n

Perhaps the physical highlight of the day came when rookie tight end Tyler Neville<\/a> knocked over defensive end James Houston seconds before linebacker Damone Clark knocked over Neville in the open field, sparking a pushing match between Neville and Clark. <\/p>\n

There wasn\u2019t a question about the Cowboys\u2019 physicality against each other. There is a question about whether that would be indicative of physicality against other teams, however. <\/p>\n

Schottenheimer\u2019s hope for physicality, like any pillar, was built early. He promised training camp would be that way on the first day of practice. He reinforced that pillar often. <\/p>\n

The Cowboys showed some potential to be physical, too. Their defenders would punch at ballcarriers on every play before the pads went on. They had three fights in three days of camp.<\/a> Eventually, Schottenheimer even ended a practice early and had his team run when a punch was thrown by rookie offensive tackle Ajani Cornelius. <\/p>\n

When the Cowboys had to go against other teams, however, that physicality was tested \u2014 unsuccessfully, too. Anecdotally speaking, the Los Angeles Rams won the physicality battle in their joint practice in Oxnard. Days later, it appeared they won it again in the preseason opener. Schottenheimer mentioned that the team\u2019s pad level was too high and that they needed to improve tackling. <\/p>\n

Tackling improved against the Ravens in a 31-13 loss on Saturday,<\/a> but the overall physicality didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

Tuesday\u2019s practice was a good step in a physical direction. Whether they can elevate it to Schottenheimer\u2019s liking by the time they head to Philadelphia for the season opener remains to be seen. <\/p>\n

Schottenheimer believes it\u2019s possible, however. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t look at [the Ravens game] and say, \u2018Oh, hey, this is just a preseason game. It doesn\u2019t matter,\u2019\u201d Schottenheimer said. \u201cI\u2019ve never said that, I would never say that. It does matter. Every time we get a chance to go out and compete, you compete to win.\u201d<\/p>\n

And every time they go out, Schottenheimer wants them to be physical, too. That\u2019s his standard.<\/p>\n

Find more Cowboys coverage from The Dallas Morning News here<\/b><\/a>.<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FRISCO \u2014 Cowboys head coach Brian Schottenheimer has made it clear that his expectations for his first head…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":159856,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5135],"tags":[5229,29841,7311,1596,8998,1232,358,92591,20026,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-159855","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-dallas","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-brian-schottenheimer","10":"tag-cowboys","11":"tag-dallas","12":"tag-dallas-cowboys","13":"tag-nfl","14":"tag-texas","15":"tag-the-star-in-frisco","16":"tag-training-camp","17":"tag-tx","18":"tag-united-states","19":"tag-united-states-of-america","20":"tag-unitedstates","21":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","22":"tag-us","23":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115058517280836803","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159855","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=159855"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/159855\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/159856"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=159855"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=159855"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=159855"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}