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DCFanatic's Blog

There have been rumblings that the plan this season is for Roy to be on the sidelines in obvious passing situations, read here.

I’m not ready to give up on Roy Williams, and I don’t think you should be either. Not with Dave Campo coaching the secondary. Not with rookie Mike Jenkins and possibly Pacman Jones on hand to keep Williams on the sideline in passing situations. And not with Brett Maxie coaching the safeties.

Speaking of fresh faces, the arrival of Jenkins and possibly Pacman Jones should also help Williams. They’ll ensure that he stays on the sidelines in obvious passing situations, something Phillips did often late in the season.

But, ultimately, it will be up to Williams to turn things around. Once known for his run-stopping ability and talent for making what Bill Parcells called "catalytic plays," Williams didn’t register a sack last season or a single tackle for a loss.

How exactly can the starting Strong Safety having to go to the sidelines in obvious passing situations be considered turning it around? Isn't Orsborn saying in here that he's not ready to give up on Williams? After making points about bringing in two coaches to help Roy we are still going to be able to accept him going to the sideline on a 3rd and 12?

I do agree that the secondary should be better this year with the additions of Pacman, Jenkins and Scandrick, but it would also be nice to see our high salary Strong Safety on the field and making plays on third downs.

Orsborn is a good writer most of the time, but with this article he seems to be trying to lead us into the next phase of accepting Roy for what most of us think he has become, 'Just Another Guy'. That's basically saying he's not elite anymore and not at all worth the big money he is being paid.

Roy probably isn't ready to be called that just yet. I highly doubt Roy will be very happy if he has to be the first '2 down Strong Safety' in the history of the NFL. Roy should want to get back to being a feared hitter who makes a few plays here and there by defending a few passes in crucial situations. I know that's what the Cowboys and their fans want from him.

It's going to be a very sad story if Roy has to be on the sidelines in passing situations and everyone is happy or even ok with this new wrinkle to the Cowboys 2008 defense.

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Stevemc

Roy has always made plays around the line of scrimmage in college and I don't know why we keep trying to place him out of his comfort zone. I've always thought we should have him no deeper than the 1st down marker after how he was so dominant against my Longhorns in a similar fashion.

I wish we'd give a formation that placed him closer to the ball even on passing downs and see what happens. With our recent additions we have the personnel to do this and I'll be dissapointed if we don't try it. Kind of a last ditch effort to see if we should keep investing millions in a great player but limited saftey in our defensive scheme..He hasn't show improvement in his man coverage skills and deep zone coverage over the years so we need to give up on changing that about him. I say ship him off to a team that'll try him in a cover 2 or something if we're not going to change our scheme to fit the strenghts of our higher paid defensive players.

Ken Hamlin has already shown he can give us great coverage with Roy's agressiveness in run support. I've heard the mention of moving Anthony Henry to a FS position which makes sense if he's going to be in coverage as much as we've seen Roy in crucial moments last year. With Pacman and Jenkins filling Henry's pos opposite of Newmann.. Where does that leave Roy?