FRISCO, Texas — The holidays have arrived at the Dallas Cowboys warehouse.
Following the Cowboys’ 30-24 loss on “Sunday Night Football” to the San Francisco 49ers at Stadium 8, the Professional Bowl cornerback Trevon Diggs lashes out at WFAA’s Mike Lesliesports anchor and reporter for ABC’s local partner in Dallas, for Leslie’s tweet questioning his attempt to chase 49ers tight end George Kittle on a 43-yard catch-and-run. Diggs emerged from the warehouse in his shoulder pads and full uniform and rhetorically yelled at Leslie the week the reporter attempted to invite questions to elucidate Diggs’ position on that game. The exchange ended with Diggs saying, “We can talk about nuts,” while Leslie said, “We can talk about that more.”
“I felt like we were playing football. From my point of view, I don’t think I did anything wrong, but everyone has their own opinion,” Diggs said Wednesday in front of native media, along with Leslie. . “I felt like I was the last line of defense. My man was on the field and I was behind the safeties at the time, so, yeah, I was the last line of defense and I felt like I was stopping him from scoring. I took the tightest angle. high. Yes. I didn’t think my effort was a problem.”
Colder moods were widespread on Wednesday afternoon following the team’s request. Diggs spent about 11 minutes answering questions from local media participants, including Leslie, and presented Leslie with a can of Dee’s Nuts logo nuts. The cornerman presented Leslie with a choice of flavors between ranch and banana pudding, and Leslie selected ranch.
“Yeah, I shouldn’t have reacted the way I reacted. I apologize for that. It must have caught me at the right time,” Diggs said.
His senior college football professor at Alabama, Nick Saban, famously had a series about how bad it is for his players to consume media coverage of the team, calling reading articles or watching video stories about the team “poison to rats.” Diggs claims that reading Leslie’s tweet wondering what his closest attempt to defeat in San Francisco would be is exactly what Saban told him not to do when he was in school.
“Yeah, it might have been some rat poison,” Diggs said, laughing. “I fell for it a little bit. It caught me at the right time.”
However, that won’t protect Diggs from Twitter or any other social media platform.
“It’s 2024. Social media, this is it. This is what’s hot. Everyone is on social media. That’s what it is. It’s just a part of our lives now,” Diggs said. “I don’t see anything wrong with me logging in after the game or someone logging in after the game and checking what they want to check. Maybe I want to step away from the game and just scroll.”
For a player who won a national championship with Alabama in 2017 and experienced three straight seasons with the Cowboys that involved winning 12 games, Diggs has struggled to deal with a 3-4 start through 2024.
“It’s tough,” Diggs said when asked about maintaining his composure. “We’re losing. It doesn’t feel good. I hate losing. I like winning, a lot of frustration. Yeah, really frustrated. You want to win so much and you do everything you can to win and you don’t get the win. It’s easy to get frustrated.”
One of the most unexpected parts of the Diggs-Leslie exchange from the cornerback end is that he generally comes across as shy or introverted, to say the least. That doesn’t mean he doesn’t offer any success, although he doesn’t normally show his feelings that way.
“I definitely care. I definitely want to win. I definitely have a lot of emotions that I don’t show,” Diggs said. “So I let that moment take over me. Like I said, you’ve got to keep the main thing, the main thing. At the end of the day we lost, we all have to play better. We all have to find a way to win.”
Diggs explained that the Cowboys training staff has been harping on tackles all season, as Dallas is the fourth-worst tackling team in the NFL with a 14.9% ignored charge. The best results were the Miami Dolphins (15.5%), Cleveland Browns (16.3%) and Las Vegas Raiders (16.4%). That’s a big takeaway from a season in which the Cowboys had in the past been the NFL’s easiest tackling team with the lowest ignored charge in the league (9.5%).
“Tackling and stopping the run, we knew they were going to run the ball a lot, so that was definitely an emphasis. I made sure I did that. I made sure I did my job. I’m just trying to help my team. I mean I’m not Kam Chancellor (former Seattle Seahawks safety and Legion of Boom member), but when it comes time to make a play, I try to do my best, the best I can. But tackling is not my skill. [strength]It’s not my superpower, but I can deal with it. Yeah, I just try to do the best I can with what I put on the field.”
Adapt to change
Diggs has carried the burden of being the Cowboys’ Reject. 1 corner for years, but 2024 has been different for him as he is back in his first full season since tearing his ACL in the third season of the 2023 season.
“It’s been, I’m not going to say it’s been difficult; it’s just been a little bit of getting used to,” Diggs said. “I felt like the last game, I felt like myself at 110%. I felt like it had been a year since I had surgery, and it was like my high of the year and I felt good. Hitting, tackling, running and cutting. So I felt good.”
Diggs and Dallas’ defense as a whole established elite, conclusion-based popularity. Throughout the Cowboys’ three consecutive 12-win seasons from 2021 to 2023, they led the NFL in takeaways (93), interceptions (59), and quarterback blitzes (41.4%). Diggs leads the NFL with 16 interceptions since 2021, but the only one has come this season and it was in Time 1 against Cleveland Browns quarterback Deshaun Watson. The Cowboys’ metrics have taken a dive in 2024 without three-time All-Pro running back Micah Parsons (out since the 4) and 2023 NFL interceptions leader DaRon Boring (out since the end of training camp with a stress crack). in its substructure). Dallas’ five sacks in 2024 are tied for fifth-fewest in the NFL, a week in which coverage is well below par (17th in the league) in quarterback strength rate (34.8% ).
The lack of conclusions will also be attributed to injuries and the attrition of the squad by Jerry Jones “all in” offseasonbut defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer’s unused defense approach is a dozen less geared toward breakout plays, which come with takeaways, than Dan Quinn’s scheme between 2021 and 2023. Dallas played man defense at the third-highest rate of the NFL between 2021 and 2023 (33.8%), but in 2024 that figure dropped to 26.3%, roughly in the middle of the store – the 15th most in the league.
“Our defensive scheme right now doesn’t really allow us to take many turnovers,” Diggs said. “It’s more about playing good football. Playing 11-man football. Yes, much less vision of the ball. Just that we can read our man, much less man.” [coverage]. … The plays definitely changed, the scheme is really different. Trying to make it work in the best way possible. Definitely a unique defense, many decisions, we have many formations, changes, different decisions. It requires you to play a little slower, to think more, rather than knowing what you have. Like knowing, ‘Okay, I’ve got this guy.’ I can play faster. I can keep an eye on my man, I know what I have, instead of reading things and reading players.” It’s a little more effort, but it’s still good defense at the end of the day. We just have to accept it and do our best of us.”
Some might see this as an opportunity for Zimmer’s plan, but that’s not what Diggs is saying. It’s extra to work it as designed, which is the easiest to speed up the passer. The Cowboys will have to bolster their 31st-ranked rushing defense (154.6 rushing yards allowed per game), as well as their 31st-ranked scoring defense (28.3 yards allowed per game).
“It’s just getting used to it. The different calls, the different checks, also how teams want to play against us,” Diggs said. “They see that we have problems with the run, so they run the ball a lot instead of passing. It’s just little things like that, but hopefully we stop the run more, get more passes and can put the blitz packages on.” and the different coverages we have… You can’t chase it. [takeaways] because if you chase it, you might give up something that will lead to a touchdown. So you really have to stay true to the defense, stay true to the keys and play fast that way.”
