Blanket Coverage: The Jarvis Landry hit was another gigantic whiff for the NFL

The vicious high hit that sent Bills safety Aaron Williams to the hospital is exactly what the NFL should be trying to eliminate, so of course Jarvis Landry got off easy. Plus, why there's hope yet for Brock Osweiler and more Week 8 notes.

Author:
Greg A. Bedard
Publish date:
Oct 27, 2016

As if you needed more evidence that the NFL is a complete joke when it comes to player safety, the Jarvis Landry hit happened.

With 6:13 left in the second quarter of Sunday’s Bills-Dolphins game, a Jay Ajayi run went to the left side, where Landry was lined up. His assignment was to pick off the safety, Aaron Williams. Williams slowed down to read the play and didn’t see Landry coming, and the receiver left his feet and drilled Williams up high with his shoulder. Williams was knocked out of the game and taken to a hospital.

It was one of the most vicious and unnecessary hits I’ve seen in recent years, at least since the beginning of a concerted effort to cut down on headshots. Landry was flagged for unnecessary roughness, remained in the game and caught five passes for 78 yards in the Dolphins’ victory.

It was exactly the type of hit that the NFL should be working towards eliminating in the game. There’s no place for it. Landry didn’t need to hit Williams in the head. There was plenty of time and opportunity for Landry to obliterate Williams by running through the block and hitting Williams in the shoulder/torso area.

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If the NFL was serious about player safety, Landry would have been ejected from the game and suspended for the next one. Instead, Landry will be out there on Sunday for Miami. Why? Because vice president of officiating Dean Blandino says the NFL couldn’t judge intent.

“We have very few automatic ejections in the game today,” Blandino said on NFL Network’s Total Access. “If you get two unsportsmanlike conduct fouls in the same game, if you put your hands on a game official in an aggressive way, those are automatic ejections. Punching an opponent.

“Here’s Landry, he’s going to block back toward the football. He can’t go to the head-neck area of an opponent within five yards on either side of the line of scrimmage. He is going to go to the head-neck. It is certainly a foul. It is certainly something that we’ll review for potential discipline, but it’s still a football play, and it’s tough to read intent there. That’s why the officials kept him in the game. It’s not an automatic ejection. It’s up to the discretion of the crew and they didn’t feel like it was flagrant enough to throw the player out of the game.”

“Tough to read intent there”? Is Blandino serious? What else do you need to determine intent when a stationary player—a rarity on the football field in itself—is blasted by an opponent who leaves his feet and delivers a hit above the shoulder? What other reason could Landry have for launching himself? Was he trying to leap over Williams? Blandino’s babble is ridiculous and preposterous.

“It was totally unnecessary,” Bills coach Rex Ryan said on Monday. “Did he target? Did he launch? Yeah, he did all those. You can check every box you want. Was it a dirty hit? Yeah. It was unnecessary. And as I see it, it was unsportsmanlike. There’s nothing about that hit that would say any other deal.”

Leave it to Ryan to be the voice of reason. He also thinks the NFL needs to look at changing the rule.

“I think maybe we need to look at our rules a little bit,” Ryan said. “The college game may have it right. Maybe having a guy that targets or deliberately does something like that, maybe the right move is to eject the player from the game, and maybe part of another game. That’s how college does it. And I also like the fact that they review it on video.

“I guess that’s what I’m getting at, the unsportsmanlike, we’re trying to clean that part of the game up, there’s no question about it. And we should. You don’t need to do that type of stuff.”

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The NFL, as usual, is behind other sports in this area.

In soccer, a red card is issued for “serious foul plays” in which a tackle or challenge “endangers the safety of an opponent or uses excessive force or brutality.” Not only is the player ejected from the game, but he’s gone from the next one as well.

In college football, the rule is “No player shall target and make forcible contact to the head or neck area of a defenseless opponent with the helmet, forearm, hand, fist, elbow or shoulder. This foul requires that there be at least one indicator of targeting. When in question, it is a foul.”

What are the indicators? I’m glad you asked:

• A launch—that is, a player leaving his feet to attack an opponent by an upward and forward thrust of the body to make forcible contact in the head or neck area.

• A crouch followed by an upward or forward thrust.

• Leading with the helmet, shoulder, forearm, fist, hand or elbow.

For the Landry it was check, check and check. He’d be ejected in a college football game.

In the NHL, Landry would have been ejected from the game and likely suspended under Rule 48: a hit resulting in contact with an opponent’s head where the head was the main point of contact and such contact to the head was avoidable, is not permitted.

Look at this hit by Blue Jackets forward Jared Boll and tell me if there’s any difference from the Landry hit. Boll was suspended four additional games.

And, wow, isn’t it nice that the NHL has a Player Safety Twitter account where league officials actually explain decisions in a reasonable manner. You won’t hear any “it was a football play, so it’s really hard to tell what he meant” nonsense like you get from Blandino. The NHL makes real decisions in a rough-and-tumble sport and wasn’t afraid to dish out 39 suspensions that cost 176 games last season. It makes the NFL look incredibly small and weak, which it is.

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The NFL likes to talk tough about increasing player safety, but when it comes to actually doing something that could send a real message, like suspending players for vicious and unnecessary hits, it shrinks from action. The NFL, as much as it likes to perceive itself as a leader, is actually a follower in nearly every instance. Forget other professional sports—when college football is light years ahead of you, you’ve got serious issues.

“This game is the greatest game in the world because of the players,” Ryan said. “To me, we ought to protect our players at all costs. ... If we really want to protect our players, we need to look at things.”

Don’t hold your breath, Rex.

2016 NFL Re-Draft

1. Rams select Carson Wentz, QB, North Dakota State (Actual pick: Jared Goff, QB)

There’s a chance the Rams would have benched Case Keenum by now if they had drafted a quicker study, but there’s an equal chance Jeff Fisher would have applied his slow-and-steady approach to quarterback development on whomever Los Angeles had taken with the No. 1 pick. Six rookie QBs have played before Goff in 2016—Wentz gets the nod for elevating Philadelphia’s inferior supporting cast, which would definitely come in handy in L.A.

2. Eagles select Dak Prescott, QB, Mississippi State (Actual pick: Carson Wentz, QB)

Prescott is an unlikely Rookie of the Year front-runner, and his mobility, decision-making and ability to protect the ball (seven TDs against just one pick through six games) would make him an immediate fit at the helm of Doug Pederson’s offense if the Sam Bradford trade had also occurred in this alternate timeline. Wentz’s higher long-term ceiling was the only thing keeping Prescott from jumping all the way from pick No. 135 to pick No. 1, and in the wake of Wentz’s sloppy play in Week 7’s win over the Vikings, even that toss-up is no sure thing.

3. Chargers select Jalen Ramsey, DB, Florida State (Actual pick: Joey Bosa, DE)

Bosa has been excellent in the first three games of his holdout-shortened rookie season, but Ramsey is making an early case to be the best player to come out of the 2016 class. Almost immediately, he has stepped in against No. 1 receivers and held his own—in the past few weeks Amari Cooper and T.Y. Hilton have seen their numbers dip after a day of constant attention from the Jaguars’ top pick. San Diego could use depth in the secondary, and a Ramsey–Jason Verrett duo would be nightmare fuel for offensive coordinators for years to come.

4. Cowboys select Ezekiel Elliott, RB, Ohio State (Actual pick: Ezekiel Elliott, RB)

Think the Cowboys are good with using a top-five pick on the league's leading rusher through seven weeks? Prescott is already off the board in this do-over draft, but maybe Connor Cook, the mid-round QB Jerry Jones wanted all along, will still be there when Dallas goes looking for a Tony Romo understudy who can be ready at a moment's notice.

5. Jaguars select Jack Conklin, OT, Michigan State (Actual pick: Jalen Ramsey, DB)

Conklin has been the most consistent of this year’s rookie tackles, fitting right in on the nasty offensive line that has powered the Titans’ rushing attack to second in the league. The Jaguars’ run game sits 31st in total yards through seven weeks—and their pass-first offense doesn’t explain it away, as they’re managing just 3.7 yards per rush. Jacksonville was incredibly lucky Ramsey fell out of the top four in the first place; in this re-do, Dave Caldwell gets a chance to add some support for his offensive playmakers.

6. Ravens select Laremy Tunsil, OT, Ole Miss (Actual pick: Ronnie Stanley, OT)

The draft’s biggest what-if: Who would have selected Tunsil if video of the consensus top lineman smoking marijuana through a gas mask bong hadn’t hit the internet moments before the draft started? Stanley has endured a frustrating start to his rookie year, missing the past four games with a foot injury, while Tunsil has steadily come into his own at left guard clearing the way for the resurgent Dolphins.

7. 49ers select Jared Goff, QB, California (Actual pick: DeForest Buckner, DE)

Trapped on the Rams sideline at midseason, Goff is still a mystery, but a mystery would represent a significant step up from the known quantities San Francisco has played at quarterback so far this season. Buckner collected his first two sacks in Week 6, but he is also part of the cast of dozens responsible for the 49ers’ abysmal run defense.

8. Titans select Joey Bosa, DE, Ohio State (Actual pick: Jack Conklin, OT)

With the benefit of hindsight, the team who picks Bosa would know how seriously the Ohio State star takes the issue of offset language in the negotiation of his rookie deal. Regardless, 16 games of production at this pace would feel like a steal for Tennessee at No. 8: Bosa has had two multi-sack games in three weeks and never stops working toward the ball.

9. Bears select Leonard Floyd, LB, Georgia (Actual pick: Leonard Floyd, LB)

Floyd terrorized the Packers in Week 7 with two sacks and a forced fumble he recovered himself for a touchdown, by far the loudest statement he’s made in a quiet but promising first two months. The 1–6 Bears have plenty of holes to fill, but it’s hard to find a receiver or defensive back that has played well enough to knock Floyd from this spot.

10. Giants select Karl Joseph, S, West Virginia (Actual pick: Eli Apple, CB)

With Apple still finding his footing and Janoris Jenkins earning his splashy free-agent deal as a complement to Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie, the Giants may prefer in hindsight to have added a little more athleticism at safety. It wouldn’t be hard to find a space for the smaller, slighter Joseph to play off Landon Collins’s bruising style in the back—Joseph has settled in quickly on an Oakland defense that has demanded plenty of its safeties so far.

11. Buccaneers select Vernon Hargreaves, CB, Florida (Actual pick: Vernon Hargreaves, CB)

Hargreaves has been quiet (in a good way) for the Buccaneers, who dropped him right into their starting lineup in Week 1 and kept him there. The numbers may not be there yet, but the early returns on this year’s rookie cornerback class point to few sure things at the position, and Tampa Bay won’t regret snapping up one of them.

12. Saints select Yannick Ngakoue, DE, Maryland (Actual pick: Sheldon Rankins, DT)

New Orleans is only just now getting Rankins back from injured reserve after the Louisville product suffered a broken fibula in training camp. Ngakoue doesn’t plug the interior the way Rankins is expected to when healthy, but third-round pick has gotten to the QB with regularity and overshadowed the rest of Jacksonville’s flashy defensive line in the first half. Ngakoue and Terrell Suggs are the only players to collect four sacks and an interception in the first five games of their NFL career.

13. Dolphins select Cody Whitehair, OL, Kansas State (Actual pick: Laremy Tunsil, OT)

In a world where the Dolphins don’t luck into one of the draft’s top prospects nearly midway through the first round, Whitehair is a perfectly acceptable consolation prize. He may never slide outside to tackle the way Tunsil is eventually expected to, but Jay Ajayi’s breakout has underscored the importance of sound interior line play in Miami, and Whitehair has helped stabilize that chronic problem area for the Bears, moving from guard to center admirably when preseason injuries forced some shuffling of the line in Chicago.

14. Raiders select Keanu Neal, S, Florida (Actual pick: Karl Joseph, S)

Neal has been all over the field for the Falcons, with two forced fumbles and a pair of passes defended after missing the first two weeks of the season with a knee injury. If the Raiders can’t have their first-choice safety Joseph, defensive coordinator Ken Norton Jr. would have no problem making use of the weapon Dan Quinn (Norton’s former colleague on the Seattle defensive staff) has deployed as Atlanta’s Kam Chancellor.

15. Browns select Will Fuller, WR, Notre Dame (Actual pick: Corey Coleman, WR)

Coleman was off to a promising start through two weeks before suffering a broken hand in practice that has sidelined him ever since. Will Fuller was just as electric out of the gate for Houston, and although he’s coming out of a dreadful three-week stretch (a combined five catches for 26 yards against two of the league’s best defenses in Minnesota and Denver, plus a hamstring injury that forced him to miss Week 6), no first-year receiver has shown off a higher ceiling.

16. Lions select Eli Apple, CB, Ohio State (Actual pick: Taylor Decker, OT)

Even before the Lions lost top corner Darius Slay to a hamstring injury in Week 7, their defense was thin on the perimeter. Apple has had an equal share of solid plays and rookie learning experiences within New York’s improved defense. Sitting 28th in the league with 8.2 yards allowed per pass attempt through seven weeks, Detroit could live with a few teachable moments.

17. Falcons select Deion Jones, LB, LSU (Actual pick: Keanu Neal, S)

With their first round pick off the board, the Falcons grab their second-round pick ahead of a long line of teams in the back half of the first round who need help at linebacker. Jones’s exceptional athleticism has translated to the pros seamlessly, and he got to put it on display in taking the first of his two interceptions this season 90 yards to the house in New Orleans. He seems to make Atlanta’s entire defense faster.

18. Colts select Jatavis Brown, LB, Akron (Actual pick: Ryan Kelly, C)

Brown’s unassuming size (5’ 11”, 212 pounds) and unassuming school (Akron) knocked him down to the fifth round, but he has made evaluators look foolish with an explosive start after stepping in for Manti Te’o in San Diego. The speed that helps Brown fly to the ball and the ball-hawking skills that he uses to make something happen once he arrives—he has three sacks and two forced fumbles so far—would bring a little stability to Indianapolis’s disintegrating defense.

19. Bills select Darron Lee, LB, Ohio State (Actual pick: Shaq Lawson, DE)

The Bills are only just now easing Lawson into the defensive rotation after the Clemson product spent the first six weeks of the season on the physically unable to perform list. They have gotten surprising results at linebacker from NFL sack leader Lorenzo Alexander and team-leading tackler Zach Brown, but Rex Ryan has to have his eye on the speedy rookie that slotted right into the linebacker corps of Ryan’s prior employer.

20. Jets select Jordan Jenkins, LB, Georgia (Actual pick: Darron Lee, LB)

Next to his college teammate Leonard Floyd, Jenkins was seen as a more traditional, lower-ceiling linebacker prospect without the eye-popping athleticism that draws first-round attention. After missing two games with a calf injury, Jenkins cracked the Jets’ rotation and provided some reliability in run support they’ll sign back up for now that Lee has been stolen by a division rival.

21. Texans select DeForest Buckner, DE, Oregon (Actual pick: Will Fuller, WR)

Michael Zagaris/San Francisco 49ers/Getty Images

The knowledge that J.J. Watt would be lost for the year after summer back surgery would probably have pulled the Texans away from their playmaker-heavy draft strategy in search of more immediate help in the trenches. Buckner and Jadeveon Clowney would make for an intimidating (if still somewhat raw) pair of rushers coming off opposite edges.

22. Redskins select Artie Burns, CB, Miami (Actual pick: Josh Doctson, WR)

Achilles issues have scuttled Doctson’s rookie year, and the list of healthy, dependable first-year wideouts to replace him in this do-over thins out quicker than anyone could have expected it would this spring. It may be best for Washington to turn its attention to the secondary, where nearly everyone has been banged up at one point or another. The Steelers’ first-round pick, Burns is tied for the team lead with four passes defended and has been taking on more responsibility week by week.

23. Vikings select Derrick Henry, RB, Alabama (Actual pick: Laquon Treadwell, WR)

The Vikings have the NFL’s best record and its worst rushing attack, while Henry is the picture of Tennessee’s embarrassment of riches in the running game. He has gotten limited work behind DeMarco Murray, but he would represent a giant upgrade over the Jerick McKinnon-Matt Asiata duo that has combined to average just 3.2 yards per carry. Treadwell is just the latest rookie to go missing in the slow-and-steady developmental approach favored by coach Mike Zimmer—at running back, the Vikings can’t be so picky.

24. Bengals select Ryan Kelly, C, Alabama (Actual pick: William Jackson III, CB)

Even if the Colts had passed on Kelly in April, someone would have taken the 2016 draft’s best center prospect in the first round. Based on the early returns in Indianapolis, he could have pushed Russell Bodine for starting duties in Cincinnati right out of the gate.

25. Steelers select Su’a Cravens, S, USC (Actual pick: Artie Burns, CB)

Toni L. Sandys/The Washington Post via Getty Images

Cravens got off to a solid start in Washington, coming up with the clinching interception in the Redskins’ first win of the season over the Giants, and last weekend he returned from a concussion that cost him two weeks. He has been the versatile back-seven threat he was advertised as coming out of college, and the Steelers wouldn’t have grabbed defensive backs with their first two picks of 2016 if they thought their incumbent secondary was all set with playmakers.

26. Broncos select Cody Kessler, QB, USC (Actual pick: Paxton Lynch, QB)

Would Kessler have stood out in Denver’s crowded QB race the way he turned heads in Cleveland? He has silenced Draft Twitter’s snark in piloting a surprisingly fun Browns offense after injuries to Robert Griffin III and Josh McCown handed him the starting job, and if Kessler stays upright himself down the stretch, he’ll give whichever QB Cleveland drafts in 2017 all the rookie can handle in camp. Gary Kubiak has crafted his offense to accommodate much lesser talents at various points over the past two years.

27. Packers select WR Michael Thomas, WR, Ohio State (Actual pick: Kenny Clark, DT)

Jody Nelson’s return hasn’t fixed the Packers’ offense the way many hoped it would, and even if it had Aaron Rodgers wouldn’t say no to another receiver who can get open downfield. Thomas, the latest beneficiary of the high-flying Saints offense, leads all rookie wideouts with 437 yards. If he can earn Drew Brees’s trust so quickly, he can earn Rodgers’s.

28. 49ers select Sterling Shepard, WR, Oklahoma (Actual pick: Joshua Garnett, G)

San Francisco is even more barren at receiver than it is at quarterback, so what better place to slot in the draft’s most polished product at that position? Shepard has run hot and cold with the Giants’ unpredictable offense, but he could easily one-up the surprising success Jeremy Kerley has found sucking up targets from 49ers passers this year.

29. Cardinals select Hunter Henry, TE, Arkansas (Actual pick: Robert Nkemdiche, DT)

Nkemdiche has been a non-factor in the first half, buried within a loaded front seven. Instead of pouring resources into another reclamation project, the Cardinals might be wishing they’d addressed their unexpectedly streaky passing attack, which has suffered from injuries and inconsistency so far. Adding a big-play tight end (Henry was far and away the best in the class and has shined of late in San Diego) might round out Carson Palmer’s options nicely and get the rest of the offense rolling up to all-purpose back David Johnson’s All-Pro pace.

30. Panthers select Kendall Fuller, CB, Virginia Tech (Actual pick: Vernon Butler, DT)

Kenneth K. Lam/Baltimore Sun/TNS via Getty Images

Sure, the Panthers whiffed by slow-playing their search for Josh Norman’s replacement. But as mentioned above, there just haven’t been that many impressive rookie corners in the early going this fall. Fuller has acquitted himself well after stepping in as the Redskins’ nickel corner—would he beat out fellow rookies Daryl Worley and James Bradberry for the No. 1 corner job in Carolina? While we’re here in the land of counterfactuals, it might be worth a roll of the dice.

31. Seahawks select Joe Thuney, G, NC State (Actual pick: Germain Ifedi, G)

Ifedi’s first two months as a pro have been marked by injury and inconsistency, while Thuney, a third-round pick (No. 78) by the Patriots, has earned rave reviews. He could have provided an upgrade at any number of positions in Seattle, where no one is safe on the much-maligned O-line.

Blanket Coverage

Go crazy, folks

The shine is off the Giants: For a long time, probably back to the inception of the NFL, the Giants have been one of the gold standard franchises. It was a franchise that exuded class and appeared to exhibit the best of the NFL. Maybe we glossed over a few things (ahem, Lawrence Taylor), but there’s little question that the Giants are like any other franchise after the Josh Brown saga. The Giants completely screwed this up and were way too slow to accept responsibility. There’s no excuse. The Giants will never be viewed the same after this, and for good reason.

Tate gets it, Fitzpatrick doesn’t: Two NFL players were benched in recent weeks, as the Lions sat down receiver Golden Tate and the Jets did the same with quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick. Tate said that the benching “lit a fire under my tail a little bit” and “I had to dig deep a little bit” and “had to soul search.” Fitzpatrick whined about how nobody believed in him. “When the owner stops believing in you and the GM stops believing in you and the coaches stop believing in you, sometimes all you have is yourself,” Fitzpatrick said. Good for you, Golden Tate. You actually handled your profession like a grown up.

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Slow your roll

Osweiler isn’t a lost cause: Not to be the Brock Osweiler defender, because he has some serious issues with his game, most notably being that he’s not winning before the snap and his post-snap processing is a step or two late. But there should be a little context applied. The Texans’ three losses and Osweiler’s worst games all came on the road against the Vikings (great defense), Broncos (great defense) and the Patriots, who invented the offense the Texans run, in a Thursday night game. In those three losses, Osweiler completed 52.4% of his passes for 4.12 yards per attempt and a 58.9 passer rating. In the other games, Osweiler completed 63.2% of his passes for 7.1 yards per attempt and a rating of 83.2. That’s still not great (as a season-long rating, it would rank 25th in the league, between Carson Palmer and Cam Newton), but not as bad as some of the commentary about Osweiler has implied.

Overtime is fine: After the Seahawks and Cardinals tied 6–6 on Sunday night, people have wondered if the NFL needs to make changes so that ties are avoided. In the last decade there have only been five—why would we need to make changes for that? The way I look at it, if the teams don’t want their games to end in a tie, they have plenty of opportunities to avoid it. If a tie hurts them, it’s their own fault.

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10 thoughts on Week 8

1. I’ve tried to figure out a way the Colts can stop the Chiefs enough to steal a victory, but I haven’t been able to do it. The Chiefs should be able to run and throw at will against the Colts. That being said, the Colts have sneakily started to play better on the offensive line.

2. One of the strange things about this NFL season is that the Raiders are 4–0 on the road (all games in the Eastern Time Zone) and 1–2 at home. They play at Tampa Bay on Sunday before four straight games in Oakland.

3. The Falcons are young, talented and undisciplined on defense, and that could be a problem against the Packers. Teams that have done the best against Aaron Rodgers have been able to keep him in the pocket and not make plays with his legs. It takes a lot of discipline to rush Rodgers but not go all out. Can the Falcons do that? Doubt it, but we’ll have to see.

4. Of the Chargers’ last seven visits to Denver, six have been decided by seven points or fewer. Expect another tight contest on Sunday. The Chargers, with all their injuries, shouldn’t be this competitive, but they are. If San Diego can pull the upset, it should be favored in the next four games on the schedule.

5. The NFC Championship Game rematch between the Cardinals and Panthers could very well be an elimination game for both. It’s starting to look like the NFC wild cards will be won at 10–6. The Panthers are 1–5. A loss would drop the Cardinals to 3-4-1. They’d have to go 7–1 down the stretch to edge a 10–6 team. That’s a tall task.

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6. It’s a shame, because the Cardinals have, finally, made some good adjustments and are back to playing close to their level in 2015. Offensively, they’ve gone through David Johnson and lived with the short passing game. On defense they’ve added an extra defensive back to many sets and have improved their coverage.

7. Wouldn’t be surprised to see the Seahawks and Cardinals struggle on Sunday. Their matchup last week was that physical, and there could be a hangover.

8. Cowboys-Eagles will come down to whether or not Dallas can put pressure on Carson Wentz (doubtful), and whether the Eagles can limit Ezekiel Elliott (maybe). This is a good matchup for the Eagles.

9. Philadelphia allowed 230 rushing yards to Washington in Week 6, but the Eagles have allowed an average of 66.5 yards on the ground in the other games since the opener. The X-factor on Sunday night could be Dak Prescott’s legs. If the Eagles key on Elliott, which they should, Prescott may have chances with his legs.

10. If the Cowboys are to emerge with a victory, end DeMarcus Lawrence needs to have a huge game. Dallas should switch him from the right side to the left so he can matchup with rookie right tackle Halapoulivaati Vaitai.