Is the description above from the 2012 season or the 2013? If you answered "C" "both", you would be correct. It's like "Groundhog Day" here in the Cowboys fandom. Last year 2012, the Cowboys beat the Giants opening week only to lose to Seattle on the road the following week.
This year 2013, the Cowboys beat the Giants opening week only to go on the road in Kansas City and lose to the Chiefs.
There will be finger pointing at the coaches, play calling, lack of running game, Romo's mistakes, Wide Receiver mistakes/drops, running back fumbles, inability of defense to stop the offense when it mattered, lack of turnovers by the offense, etc, etc, etc. Does this sound familiar?
That of course is a rhetorical question, of course it sounds familiar. It is the same set of problems we, the fans, have heard every year for what seems like an eternity. If you go to Dallas Morning News, Fort-Worth Star Telegram, ESPNdallas.com or any other Cowboys based blog or sporting news site you will hear many opinions and ideas on the problems and what to do to fix them.
- You will read about the lack of defensive line depth which made the defense look tired in the 4th quarter when they needed to stop the Chief's time eating running attack. That would be correct.
- You will undoubtedly read about Dez Bryants dropped pass in the 2nd half which would've been a big gainer, and maybe even a TD. That would be correct.
- You will read about the Cowboys inability to run the ball. That would be correct.
- You will read about how the coaches and offensive play calling abandoned the run in the 2nd half and went to the pass too often. That would be correct.
- You will read how the Cowboys lost the turn over battle -2, by the offense not protecting the ball (2 fumbles) and the defense not creating any turnovers. That would be correct.
- You will read how the Cowboys were ineffective in the red zone. That would be correct.
Lack of dept at defensive line - Every team in the parity led NFL has some areas where they are a little thin.
Dez's dropped pass - As frustrating as it can be for a person to have only one job in life, and that one job is to catch footballs, to then watch this person drop a ball placed perfectly in his hands. This happens every week on every team. Wide Receivers drop balls (ask Tom Brady). One dropped ball by Dez is not what lost the game.
Cowboys inability to run the ball and abandoning the run play calling - frustrating, but can be overcome with a good passing game in today's NFL. (once again ask Tom Brady).
Losing the turnover battle - this will happen in the NFL, some weeks you will win the turnover differential, some weeks you won't. But when you lose the turn over battle and are only 4 points behind in the 4th quarter, this no longer becomes the reason why you lost.
This brings us to the last point, inability to score Touchdowns, particularly when the Cowboys are in the Red Zone. After watching the game, this particular point and the disjointed appearance of the Cowboys offense is what stands out. In today's NFL, you have to score points and lots of them to win. And when your defense holds the opposing team to less than 20 points, you have to win the game. With Dez Bryant, Miles Austin, Jason Witten, Terrance Williams, DeMarco Murray and Tony Romo you should score more than 16 points against any defense in the NFL. This premise however is based on the assumption that each of these players are as good as they are paid accordingly. I'm afraid after watching this game and the other 64 games in the previous 4 years, there is a flaw in one of these basic assumptions.
The flawed assumption is that of Tony Romo. I know when everyone reads this line, the Romo lovers and maybe even Romo haters will say, yeah, Romo is part of the problem but he's not all of the problem. And this argument would be correct. As with all teams in this age of parity, everyone has multiple problems. But let me ask one simple question.......
If the Cowboys would've had Peyton Manning, Eli Manning, Aaron Rodgers, Drew Brees, Tom Brady, even the great Joe Flacco at the helm as QB, would the Cowboys have overcome the 2 turnover differential and the 1 point deficit and won the game?
My answer is Yes.
Of course the argument would be, well yeah of course you could win the game with future Hall of Famers Peyton Manning and Tom Brady. And that's my point exactly. Everyone wants to believe that Romo is somehow one of these elite Quarterbacks and the only reason he hasn't won was because of the coaches, the play calling, the offensive line, etc. etc. etc. But the simple and obvious fact is that he is just not that great. Is he a good quarterback? Sure. Compared to Quincy Carter he looks like the 2nd coming of Roger Staubach. But he's just not great, and not even that good. He's mediocre to good. Which sometimes is OK. There have been teams like the Baltimore Ravens led by Trent Dilfer and Tampa Bay Buccaneers led by Brad Johnson who have won Superbowls, but they won them with mediocre QBs accompanied by great defenses and great running games. But the assumption based theory that the Cowboys organization is working off of, and thereby putting the salary cap money into, is that they have a Great/Elite Quarterback in Tony Romo, and thereby by can skimp on things like Offensive and Defensive line. Yes, Green Bay with Aaron Rodgers and Patriots with Tom Brady can do that. But the Cowboys can not because they are working on a faulty assumption that Romo is that type of elite QB, and unfortunately he's not. He's is more like his pedigree suggests, a free agent from Northeastern Illinois University.
So I'm not blaming everything on Romo. I blame the faulty assumption that he is great/elite by the Cowboys front office. A lot of teams would love to have Romo, and he would probably do well with a lot of those teams because without a great Quarterback they have out of necessity built strengths in other parts of their team. Romo could move into another team with better parts and look really good, because he would be more of a compliment to the system rather than being the focal point of the entire team and expected to lead every victory.
Now on top of this faulty assumption by the Cowboys organization, they have doubled down by giving Romo a $100 Million Dollar contract, included him in the game planning as well as increasing his play calling responsibility at the line of scrimmage. So how has that worked out so far? About as good as you would expect a free agent from Northeaster Illinois to perform. Not well enough to carry the team. I don't want to sound like a defeatist, but with the money invested in Romo which destroys salary cap space and the continued faulty assumption by the Cowboys front office, the incredible "Groundhog Day" like re-runs will continue. The Cowboys will end up around 8-8, 9-7 if they are lucky or 7-9 if they are unlucky. It's not Romo's fault that he's not great, but it's the organizations fault in treating him like he is great. So for now it will continue to be the same ole Cowboys.
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