Cowboys want a defense in disguise. Heres how Christian Parker plans to get them there

FRISCO — Cowboys coach Brian Schottenheimer didn’t care to compare how his defense looked during OTAs to a year ago.

“Last year just didn’t work,” Schottenheimer said on Thursday. “We know that, and that’s for different reasons.”

Chief among those reasons was the group’s struggle to communicate and line up correctly. It led to blown coverages, poor run fits, lots of points allowed — the most in the league, in fact  — and an early end to the Matt Eberflus era as defensive coordinator. 

Now, under first-time defensive coordinator Christian Parker, the Cowboys’ overhauled defense is being asked to communicate and line up so well that they can disguise coverages and confuse quarterbacks. Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither will Parker’s defense, but both had to start somewhere. For the Cowboys, that road began this week at OTAs. 

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“It’s not going to be perfect right away,” said new Cowboys cornerback Cobie Durant, “but come September, it will.”

It takes a lot for a defense to disguise, but it’s worth it. 

Offenses have an inherent edge on defenses. Everyone on offense knows what a play entails. Defenders, meanwhile, are tasked with reacting. A defense without the ability to disguise well — like the Cowboys a year ago  — is at an even bigger disadvantage. Disguised coverage, however, can even the playing field. 

“Some teams, they’ll show a three-high [defender] shell and then they’ll move back to a shell-based quarters, Cover 2, whatever it is,” Schottenheimer said. “Some guys start in a shell-based and they go down to a 3-deep.”

Translation: a defense’s coverage isn’t always what it seems.   

But how does a defense get to that point? 

First, it requires the right personnel. The Cowboys put an emphasis this offseason on acquiring versatile players, especially in their secondary. Their big free agent signing was former Cardinals safety Jalen Thompson. They also added former Broncos safety P.J. Locke, who played for multiple years in Denver when Parker was their secondary coach. They then drafted former Ohio State safety Caleb Downs with the No. 11 pick in the draft. 

The Cowboys also wanted to ensure they had players who were comfortable playing in space. As of right now, it looks like they could pair new linebacker Dee Winters with DeMarvion Overshown inside. The combo should provide plenty of speed, especially in space. 

The next step is a lot more difficult. Eventually, once the Cowboys fully understand their defensive scheme, they have to learn how to work together to keep an offense confused and not tip their next move. Schottenheimer said offenses are always looking for tells from a defense. They scout them, they study them, they read them in the brief moments when an offense lines up and before they snap the ball. 

Every second a defender moves, more information is presented to an opposing quarterback. 

“Because if the weakside linebacker — or dime, as we call him  — if he’s giving away the fact that the safety is coming down, guess what? It doesn’t matter how good the disguise is in the back half,” Schottenheimer said, “because the linebacker was telling Dak [Prescott] or whoever what coverage we’re going to do. So it truly is a full unit that has to be aligned, and that’s what we’re seeing now.

As Locke said on Thursday, “You just want to make everything look the same.”

The Cowboys are beginning at the ground floor of that alignment, as they showed Thursday. 

They finished stretching and broke off in groups, just as previous Cowboys defenses would do at the start of practice. There was a small twist, however. These groups weren’t position-dependent. Which is why you’d have a group of defensive tackle Quinnen Williams, outside linebacker Rashan Gary and cornerback Josh Butler all lined up together, doing the same drill before rotating to a new station.

“It’s one step at a time,” Locke said. “It’s one step at a time.

“Which is why it’s great to have OTA practices, so we can make mistakes early. Even in training camp it’s the same thing. It’s building blocks.”

The Cowboys hope their work will build toward being a defense that can confuse the best quarterbacks in the league. It’ll take time and a lot of cohesive effort to get there.

“Just dialing in as a whole 11 — cornerbacks, safeties, linebackers and defensive line  — if they’re giving us a good rush, and we’re disguising like we need to disguise, then we’ll give the quarterbacks havoc in the backfield,” Durant said. 

And on their own offense.

“It’s annoying,” Cowboys wide receiver CeeDee Lamb said about facing it in practice. “It’s been annoying to prepare against, but obviously just seeing it practice every day, it’s kind of unique, just seeing different guys communicate and being able to understand and take what they learn from the meeting room and being able to easily translate it on the field. It’s good to go against, it’s very tricky.”