Why Justin Jefferson shouldn’t maul Cowboys amid NFC clash with Vikings

The Dallas Cowboys are coming off one of their worst losses of the season, and it’s not just about the team that beat them or their record at the time.

It’s also not about the fact that the Philadelphia Eagles also dropped a game on the following day, which means they could have picked up a game over them.

It’s about how it happened.

The Cowboys allowed a wide receiver that has been hampered by drops and injury all season to, pretty much, beat them by himself. En route to helping his offense amass 415 total yards on this celebrated Cowboys defense, Green Bay wideout, Christian Watson, would haul in four of his eight targets for catches to go for 107 yards.

With 75 percent of those catches being touchdowns, he would top it all off with a long bomb of a catch for a touchdown of 58 yards which was also the play that saw Anthony Brown concussed. With that game needing to be in the rearview mirror though, that performance by an otherwise, pedestrian Watson on the season, really makes you wonder about the Cowboys’ upcoming matchup.

The Cowboys have a tough test against the Vikings, but Justin Jefferson shouldn’t be the issue

In this one, they won’t be facing a guy with the potential to one day come into his own as one of the league’s best. Rather, they’re facing a guy that has already arrived in just his third season in the league. Facing off against Justin Jefferson and the Minnesota Vikings Sunday, how will the Cowboys ever be able to contain the guy that made this huge fourth down, had to have it, grab?

After you watch a guy make plays like these to help his team get an upset victory, for lack of better terms, over one of the overwhelming favorites to win the Super Bowl this season, you should be as motivated as ever to make sure he isn’t the sole reason you lose in your chance to match up with him.

Enter Trevon Diggs who helped hold Jefferson to just two catches and 21 yards in their last matchup. You’ll see a ton of him on Jefferson, but also a bunch of other stuff to keep Jefferson from killing you.

One of several ways that the Cowboys will probably go about trying to prevent that is by rolling coverage to Jefferson whenever possible. You’ll see layered coverage, with LBs and DBs of different levels taken away certain areas at certain depths from Jefferson.

You’ll see pure double teams, especially in the form of safety help, which also takes you somewhere else. With Donovan Wilson’s penchant for the safety blitz, you may see a bit less of that this week as they need all the bodies and help they can get to protect the backside from Jefferson.

And that takes us to the last part of how they might go about it. Kirk Cousins will throw you one, so the Cowboys will have to deploy Micah Parsons more as a pure pass-rusher to, hopefully, get pure sacks or coverage sacks from the successful marriage of defensive line play and coverage.

Now, all of those schematics and deployments are on top of the triple-layered pain of their last defeat. They were beaten by a struggling team that was just searching for something, desperate almost, which could explain a bit about that game. No one thought Watson would be a huge factor. This team knows to prepare for Jefferson.

The Cowboys were beaten on defense, after being up two scores late in the game, when you knew exactly what the opposing side wanted to do, and by a receiver that has yet to do that to anyone else this season. And lastly, because you missed an opportunity to pick up a game on the team that is, not only, leading your division, but the conference and entire league.

It is worth noting that a defeat to Aaron Rodgers is just a bit better than losing to Taylor Heinicke and the Commanders, but a defeat is a defeat. However, all of the above reasons are why, though it will still be a battle and though the Cowboys can certainly still lose, they shouldn’t get absolutely obliterated by JJettas.

At least, you certainly hope not.