Week 2 DVOA: Dallas Cowboys and the Best Defensive Starts Ever

The Dallas Cowboys are kicking ass and taking names. They started out with a 40-0 blowout against the New York Giants, and they followed up with a dominating 30-10 win over the New York Jets. The Cowboys are historically great on defense and are enjoying the best start of any Cowboys team in the last 42 years.

Let’s take care of the latter first. The 2023 Cowboys have the highest DVOA of any Dallas team since the DVOA stats begin in 1981. This is a better start than any of those 1990s Cowboys teams enjoyed. Here are the best Cowboys teams through two weeks and how they finished the season:

Now, there’s a bit of an asterisk here because while the 2023 Cowboys have the highest DVOA for any Cowboys team through two weeks, they do not have the highest DVOA for any Cowboys team through three weeks. You’ll be pretty surprised at which Cowboys team owns that mark. Four years ago, the Cowboys started 3-0 and that included a 31-6 blowout of the Miami Dolphins in Week 3. So the 2019 Cowboys rose to 68.5% DVOA after three weeks, higher than the current Cowboys. That team also then lost the next three games and finished the season 8-8, although they were one of the best 8-8 teams ever by DVOA (sixth overall).

This year’s Cowboys offense has been nothing special so far, basically average. The defense, on the other hand, has been stifling. So stifling that the Cowboys rank as one of the top defenses ever measured by DVOA through two games.

A fantastic start like the current Cowboys are enjoying doesn’t guarantee that the team in question will have a great defense all year long. After all, look at the 2002 Chargers. However, the rest of these defenses all had good years. Three of them led the league for that season. The team that would be 13th on this list, the 1991 Philadelphia Eagles, has the best defensive DVOA of all time.

Now, I know what you’re saying. “Sure, the Cowboys defense has been good, but you aren’t including opponent adjustments yet. They played Daniel Jones and Zach freakin’ Wilson. It’s not that hard to put up good defensive games against those guys.” That’s true, but it isn’t like bad quarterbacks were just invented last year. In 43 years of DVOA ratings, we have measured a lot of defenses going up against a lot of bad quarterbacks. The quarterbacks faced in Weeks 1-2 by the teams on the table above included:

• DeShone Kizer
• Andrew Walter
• Blaine Gabbert
• The broken-down 1981 corpse of Bert Jones
• Rick Mirer
• J.P. Losman
• David Carr, and more importantly the 2002 expansion Houston Texans offensive line
• Jack Thompson, aka “The Throwin’ Samoan“
• Somebody named Scott Stankavage who I had never heard of before writing this article. Stankavage was the third-string quarterback for the 1984 Denver Broncos, an undrafted rookie out of North Carolina. Both John Elway and Gary Kubiak got hurt against the Chicago Bears so Stankavage had to come in and complete four of 18 passes for 58 yards and an interception. That was his last regular game in the NFL; he also played in three games during the 1987 strike as the backup quarterback — not even the starter — for the scab Dolphins.

Dominating those guys probably isn’t much different from dominating Zach Wilson. So yes, the Cowboys’ defense has been historically good so far.

Cleveland, Buffalo, New Orleans, and Baltimore currently round out the defensive DVOA top five.

The Bills are the big jumper in overall DVOA this week, moving up from 15th to third after enjoying the biggest win of the week over the Las Vegas Raiders. Other major risers include the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (from 16th to eighth), the Kansas City Chiefs (from 20th to 13th), and the Indianapolis Colts (from 28th to 15th). Remember, it’s still early and there are no opponent adjustments yet. As always, you want to look at our DAVE ratings that combine early performance with preseason projections for a better look at how good teams are right now. I don’t think anybody truly thinks the Tampa Bay Buccaneers are one of the top 10 teams in the NFL right now, 2-0 record or no 2-0 record. 

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If you’re a new reader since my move to FTN, you can look for DVOA commentary every Tuesday afternoon during the season and then Mondays during the playoffs. Check out the dropdown menus above and you’ll see we’ve added a number of DVOA stats for subscribers including:

• Adjusted line yards
• DVOA vs. types of receivers (and by direction)
• DVOA by Week

Look for more stat tables and more historical numbers coming to the site this week.

Please note that there will not be a Monday update of DVOA stats or playoff odds next week (September 25) due to Yom Kippur. We’ll do the full update on Tuesday as usual.

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These are the FTN DVOA and DAVE ratings through two weeks of 2023. Our Defense-adjusted Value Over Average (DVOA) system breaks down every single play and compares a team’s performance to the league average based on situation in order to determine value over average. (Explained further here.) Please note that there are no opponent adjustments in DVOA until after Week 4.

OFFENSE and DEFENSE DVOA are adjusted for performance indoors and consider all fumbles, kept or lost, as equal value. SPECIAL TEAMS DVOA is adjusted for type of stadium (warm, cold, dome, Denver) and week of season. As always, positive numbers represent more points so DEFENSE is better when it is NEGATIVE.

DAVE is a formula which combines our preseason forecast with current DVOA to get a more accurate projection of how a team will play the rest of the season. DAVE is currently 85% preseason forecast and 15% actual performance. DAVE ratings for the Cleveland Browns have been adjusted for the loss of Nick Chubb.