We get an old school NFC East match up Monday night in Arizona. The Dallas Cowboys (1-1) look to bounce back from an awful showing a week ago against the floundering Arizona Cardinals (1-1) on Monday Night Football.
The game is on ESPN at 8:30 p.m. EST. As always, I’ll be riding along with you hosting the Get More Sports Live Blog here at the site.
The Game: Dallas Cowboys at Arizona Cardinals (+3)
O/U: 46.5
The History
These two teams were in the same division from 1960 to 2001 so they’ve played a ton of games. It won’t surprise you to learn that the Cowboys have a pretty commanding lead in the series, 55-32-1.
In spite of that, the Cardinals have dominated the rivalry in recent years, winning the last four match ups since October, 2008 until the last time they played, November, 2014. There were two overtime games in that stretch.
Arizona/Phoenix/St.Louis and the Cowboys have met in the playoffs just once, with the Cardinals winning 20-7 on January 2, 1999. Jake Plummer outdueled Troy Aikman with 19 of 36 passing for 213 yards, two touchdowns and two picks.
The longest win streak for the Cardinals came at the beginning of the series. The then St. Louis Cardinals won six consecutive games from October, 1960 to September, 1963.
Dallas, of course, put that streak to shame later on. From October, 1990 to December, 1996 the Cowboys won 13 in a row in the Troy Aikman and Emmett Smith era.
DALLAS COWBOYS (1-1)
It’ll be interesting to see how the Cowboys handle coming back from the worst loss of the Dak Prescott and Ezekiel Elliott era (Yeah, I’m calling a season and two games an era. Just go with it.) While Dallas did drop four games, including a divisional round playoff loss to the Green Bay Packers last season, every loss was close and came down to the wire. The game against the Broncos was over in the third quarter.
Elliott took a lot of heat for his lack of heart in the game and he’s hopefully taken the criticism seriously. Prescott was called on to pass a plenty against one of the best pass defenses in the NFL and put up decent numbers, 30 of 50 passing for 238 yards, two touchdowns and two picks, but it wasn’t good enough. Especially with the Cowboys’ defense getting gashed in every conceivable fashion.
That same defense is facing a shorthanded Cardinals team Monday night that won’t nearly field the dynamic running game Denver did. What Arizona does have is some of the best defensive backs in the business and Dez Bryant, Terrence Williams, Jason Witten and Cole Beasley will be in a battle to get open all night.
ARIZONA CARDINALS (1-1)
Any preseason hype the Cardinals had about a possible resurgent season and return to the playoffs is probably dead at this point. Their bandwagon is emptier than a pro Donald Trump rally in Portland. Carson Palmer continues to look like an older version of Carson Palmer. Last week he threw for 332 yards, but only one touchdown and a pick and barely completed 50 percent of his passes. In fact, if Indianapolis Colts quarterback Jacoby Brissett hadn’t tossed that overtime pick, Arizona would be coming into this game 0-2.
As I predicted, Chris Johnson did the heavy lifting at running back and I don’t expect that to change Monday night. J.J. Nelson won me some money in daily fantasy and is really the only big play weapon Arizona has on its entire offense. Last week he caught five passes for 120 yards and a touchdown.
The Pick
I expect Dallas to return to form in a big way in this game. Look for a huge night from Elliott, both as a runner and a pass catcher and Prescott to run in a score of his own. It’s time for the Cardinals to be put out of their misery. Cowboys 31, Cardinals 19
This week
Straight up: 1-0
Against the spread: 0-1
Last week
Straight up: 11-5
Against the spread: 8-8
Season
Straight up: 22-10
Against the spread: 16-16
To make a wager on any sport, go to the world famous Diamond Sportsbook by clicking here.
