With no sacks through the first two games of 2009, Dallas's pass rush, which led the league in this regard in 2008, broke out against Carolina, bringing down Jake Delhomme thrice in the first win at Cowboys Stadium. Since then, no team has been able to turn off the spigot, as Dallas has gone on to record at least three sacks in each of their last five contests.
The Cowboys have now posted 17 sacks, tied for sixth-place in the conference; this doesn't sound all too impressive, but one must consider the log jam in this particular category. Of NFC teams, only Minnesota (31) and Philadelphia (23) have more than 18 sacks. If things continue in this manner for Dallas, they will almost surely pull away from some of those teams.
Against Seattle on Sunday, Dallas got to Matt Hasselbeck three times for twenty yards, as the pass rush was ignited in the second quarter by an unlikely source.
Linebacker Bobby Carpenter found a seam in the patchwork Seattle offensive line, shooting through and jarring the ball from Hasselbeck's grasp as he fell to the ground. Keith Brooking and DeMarcus Ware, the new $78 million man, would add sacks as well, as Hasselbeck weathered a rough day in Arlington.
It was Carpenter's first sack since his first NFL game in 2006.
"Hopefully I started the sack party," Carpenter said. "I think [it was] 37 games since my last one, so I was pretty excited to get it. Hopefully there'll be more coming. When you've got a team where so many guys can bring pressure from all angles it makes it easy for guys to get sacks because they can't afford to double team guys."
