These Dak Prescott Numbers Aren't That Hard to Believe

It's a day that ends in Y so that means the Dallas Cowboys and Dak Prescott are topics on the sports shows, including The Herd With Colin Cowherd. Today he had some sobering numbers and data regarding the much-maligned quarterback that were supposedly hard to believe until you look at him.

Here are the numbers, which prove that the Cowboys win far more often when they are running the football a lot and gaining a lot of yards while doing so.

And yeah, sure Prescott is better when the defense has to respect a formidable ground game. A person could look at this and think the Cowboys are also better when they ask him to do less. But is that something that is at all specific to Prescott?

Cowherd is a repeated TBL Sports Media Award winner so this isn't a knock on the research or the take or anything. It's just a bit surprising how often we see stats like this without some rather straightforward observations.

The first being teams tend to run the ball more often when they are winning in order to shorten the game and melt the clock. Teams that are trailing therefore tend to sling it around a bit more. So how much value is there in saying that all it takes to win is to run the ball 30 times or more? It's like a chicken and egg situation. Did they run so much they won or did they run so much because they won? Clearly not all games and rushing attacks are the same so there's a ton of room for nuance. A basic W-L number based on attempts doesn't seem to present much.

Relatedly, yes, a team tends to better when its running game is working. And worse when it's not doing anything. Football scholars may correctly point out that Prescott is more reliant on a sturdy rush attack than his peers than others, but it would be unfair to think for a second that he's some sort of bizarre outlier.

More on him tomorrow, though.