It’s been a volatile year for the narratives surrounding the Cowboys defense. Under Mike Nolan, they were pretty awful until later in the year, when players got more comfortable in the new scheme and also had the benefit of facing some bad quarterbacks. Still, the buzz was that Dallas had a historically bad defense, even though they finished 23rd in defensive DVOA, 23rd in yards allowed, and 28th in points allowed. The defense certainly wasn’t good, but not quite as terrible as people seemed to think.
Either way, Nolan was out and Dan Quinn was in. Ironically, Quinn ended up installing a scheme that’s effectively done the same thing Nolan was trying to do, utilizing exotic hybrid fronts with disguised coverages that attack a quarterback and force him into turning the ball over.