The Real Beast Of The NFC East

Last week I was online reading Dallas Morning News columnist Tim Cowlishaw’s article where he was asked to predict the order of finish in NFC East for the upcoming season, to which he replied: I have to go Philadelphia, New York, Dallas, Washington.   The Eagles were a mess the first half of last season and very good at the end. The Giants might just keep rolling but they have lost some key contributors. Dallas is better on paper than last season. I think the Redskins are bound for last with Griffin but they will be on the rise with him in the near future.

From those remarks, I decided to take a closer look at the talent level in the arguably the best division in football, the NFC East and created the below chart listing players, positions, and years of experience.  I then highlighted each player who is the best at his position and came to an interesting conclusion for Mr. Cowlishaw,  it is his home-town Dallas Cowboys who have the best talent in the NFC Eastern Division, not the Philadelphia Eagles or New York Giants.  According to my below chart, Dallas has 8 of the premier starters at key positions,  while their rival, The New York Giants finish second with 6, followed then by the Philadelphia Eagles and Washington Redskins with 3 each.

I agree that some of  my rankings can be viewed as controversial.   We can begin with QB which I have listed as a tie between Eli Manning and Tony Romo.  Although in my opinion Romo is the better QB by far.  Romo has a higher QB rating, completion percentage, and more TD’s per game then Manning.  In fact without the luck of a David Tyree miracle helmet catch, a Wes Walker 2^nd down Super Bowl bobble with 4 minutes left in the game, or a Miles Austin dropped wide open 50 yard game clinching TD pass, it isn’t even a debate.

Next, we need to look at left tackle when Tyron Smith is starting for his 1^st year and will replace the better player who is aging and injured Jason Peters and running back where if healthy Demarco Murray will not only prove he is better than LeSean McCoy but all of the running backs in the NFL.   I also rulenctly gave the nod to London Fletcher over future Pro-Bowler Sean Lee, but I feel Lee is better in coverage and his young legs will over-take Fletcher this year.

So when Cowboys owner Jerry Jones answered the big question last year, when asked why the NY Giants were playing in the Super Bowl in 2012 instead of his Cowboys, to which he replied “ I would say Eli Manning along with the NY Giants unbelievable execution at the end of games.”

As we can now see, by breaking down the talent level between all 4 of the NFC East teams below, Jones was 100% right, it isn’t the talent level that separates these NFC East teams, but it was indeed superior (some would say lucky) late game execution.  The perfect example of Jones statement comes from their late season meeting in Dallas, when a dropped wide open TD pass by Miles Austin in the 4th quarter and a blocked Dan Bailey FG in the final seconds, lead the Giants to a very questionable victory in that important division clinching game.   This year Cowboy fans without that let’s say pseudo NY Giant superior late game execution factored in, you will need to adjust those 2012 NFC East rankings to read:

 Dallas, New York, Philadelphia, and Washington.