After the Dallas Cowboys' loss to the Saints, it's fair to wonder about the Kyle Shanahan effect

ARLINGTON — It’s considered a fallacy to justify causation simply by correlation. It’s non-sensical to make comparisons when constants are lacking. As Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott said, it’s not even worth trying to compare Sunday’s 44-19 loss to the New Orleans Saints to the playoff debacle against Green Bay last season, no matter how similar they felt.

“I wouldn’t waste my time if I was y’all,” Prescott said.

All that to say, there’s a factor from Sunday’s loss that’s hard to ignore; a potential causation that’s tempting because of correlation.

Because despite the lack of constants, and despite the words of one prominent Dallas Cowboys player, it’s hard not to think that the Cowboys have a rooted problem with the Kyle Shanahan tree.

The latest example: Saints offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak.

The Kubiaks and the Shanahans go way back. Kubiak’s father, former NFL head coach Gary Kubiak, was an assistant for Kyle’s father, Mike Shanahan, for over a decade in the 90s and early 2000s.

“Klint woke up developing his own coaching style,” Cowboys head coach Mike McCarthy said this week, referring to the family play calling ties. “His father, big fan of Gary and the way he’s done it, too. From what I see, you look at someone who’s running a system that he built throughout his career.”

That included four years in Minnesota under Zimmer. Kubiak was the quarterbacks coach for the Vikings from 2019-2020. He was promoted to offensive coordinator in 2021.

Heading into Sunday’s game between the Cowboys and Saints, there was seemingly a lot of familiarity there between Zimmer and Kubiak. Besides, how much could change in coaching styles from 2021 to now? In Week 1, the Cowboys’ defense looked like a classic Zimmer defense, firing on all cylinders against the Cleveland Browns.

The next week, Zimmer’s defense looked outmatched and out of place.

Maybe it’s because Kubiak’s offense looked different than it did in Minnesota in 2021. A stop last year in San Francisco, where Kubiak was the passing game coordinator, could be the reason why.

The Saints used pre-snap motion a lot, often moving multiple players around. The Cowboys looked a step behind, almost as if they were trying to diagnose all the changes, rather than read and react. The Saints got to the edge of the Cowboys defensive line often. That set up play action, which produced some big plays for the Saints offense.

A quick tale of the tape to go with those points:

• The Saints had 310 yards of offense at the end of the first half.
• Derek Carr didn’t have an incompletion until the second quarter, starting 6-for-6 for 199 yards and two touchdowns.
• Alvin Kamara finished with four touchdowns. The Saints scored touchdowns on all of their first six drives.
• At one point near the end of the first half they were averaging 12.6 yards per play.
• A Cowboys defense that had a league-high 40 pressures against the Browns only registered one quarterback hit.

Simply put: Kubiak and the Saints couldn’t be stopped.

“We’ve had changes on defense,” McCarthy said when asked about comparing Sunday’s loss to the Packers loss. “You know, some of the changes we’ve made, was to put the emphasis on the run defense. It was not evident today. I mean, no doubt about it, they got the ball on our perimeter, you know, time and time again, in the second level. Once again, it’s saying we need to play much better. I need to coach better, and you never want to play that way, especially at home.”

And especially against members of the Shanahan tree.

Interestingly enough, Zimmer had actually had success taming Shanahan-style offenses. That’s one strike against the theory that Sunday’s defensive debacle was scheme related.

Another strike against the theory: the words of Cowboys pass rusher Micah Parsons.

“To me, it had nothing to do with the scheme,” Parsons said. “I thought [Zimmer] called a pretty good game.

“I just believe we got outplayed. Whoever played on that field, everyone didn’t play to 100%. That’s just me being accountable and saying the truth. We all got to play better.”

Cowboys owner Jerry Jones added: “I don’t know much about styles as much as I know: when [the opposing offensive line] gets off the ball like that, and they wall off your linebackers … and they’ve got your linemen turned around in the middle like that — all of that, in any style, will create a good running game. And when you get a running game going like that, you’re going to be able to throw the ball, too. We ran into that buzzsaw today.”

That can’t happen if the Cowboys want to make a deep playoff run. Change has to happen soon, because more members of the Shanahan tree await.

Maybe then we see if the Shanahan-style offense is really the root of Dallas’ defensive problems, or if that theory is just a fallacy.