Continued Mediocrity
As the Dallas Cowboys reach the bye week with a 3–4 record, you just can’t help but think of mediocrity.
They lose, then win, lose, win, lose, win, lose. See a pattern here?
They’re doing things that just cause you to scratch your head. Costly penalties, turnovers, poor coaching decisions, ineffectiveness on offense.
But then there’s the good plays that happen on offense whether that be in the passing or running game. Then key stops, turnovers, or sacks on defense.
What’s really strange is how they’re 3–0 at home but 0–4 on the road. They’ve scored at least 20 points in each home game but have yet to reach 20 on the road.
Defensively, the Cowboys are pretty good, ranking 3rd overall, including 6th against the pass.
According to Pro Football Focus, Byron Jones is the best cornerback in the NFL after switching back to the position.
What’s the main reason for that? It’s because no one is throwing on him. Credit passing game coordinator Kris Richard for improvement in the secondary.
Other guys like first-round pick Leighton Vander Esch along with fellow linebacker Jaylon Smith are playing great.
Now, let’s talk about the offense.
The last time I talked about on this blog about the Cowboys it was about the horrendous offensive performance in their season opening loss to the Carolina Panthers, 16–8.
While they have improved and certainly played better at home, it hasn’t been consistently.
In Week 2 against the New York Giants on the second play of the game, they actually took a deep shot from Dak Prescott to Tavon Austin, winning 20–13.
In Week 3, they started horribly offensively on the road against the Seattle Seahawks and lost, 24–13.
In Week 4, Prescott led a game-winning drive for a field goal to beat the Detroit Lions, 26–24, at home.
In Week 5 against the Houston Texans, head coach Jason Garrett decided not to go for it on 4th-and-1 at the Houston 42 in overtime. So they punt the ball and the Texans scored a game-winning field goal to win it, 19–16, in an inconsistent offensive performance.
In Week 6, the Cowboys exploded offensively. Prescott rushed for a career-high 82 yards as Dallas shockingly dominated the Jacksonville Jaguars, 40–7.
And then this past week in Washington against the Redskins in a huge divisional matchup, Prescott bounced back from his mistakes, including a costly fumble and led the Cowboys, who were down by 10 with under five minutes left, to field goal range down by 3.
Things got interesting though as they got to the Washington 37-yard line with 52 seconds left and one timeout. Garrett got conservative and didn’t look to make the field goal much closer with a possible shot at the end zone. As they were setting up for a 47-yard field goal, long-snapper L.P. Ladouceur had a snap infraction that moved them back five yards as Brett Maher’s kick went off the left uprights as the Skins won, 20–17. If there was no penalty at 47 yards, it would have been good.
I will say that the Cowboys got screwed by the refs on that penalty, which was a move Ladouceur has been doing all 14 years of his with the Cowboys. But it shouldn’t have come down to that in a game they needed to win.
The Cowboys are 29th in passing at a measly 183 yards per game. More has to come out of that in Prescott. Dallas is third in rushing, but it’s inconsistent on the road. Running back Ezekiel Elliott is doing his job. It’s the offensive line, which has a rookie, a backup center and a new coach.
There has been plenty of poor, conservative, lack-of-creative play-calling by offensive coordinator Scott Linehan, which Garrett has to be responsible for as well.
Both coaches need to be fired. The problem is that’s too much of a turnover in midseason.
Instead on Monday, the Cowboys traded away a first-round draft pick for Oakland Raiders receiver Amari Cooper. This puts pressure on Garrett, Linehan and Prescott to see if they are still the problem after getting a №1 wide receiver.
Cooper had two great 1,000-yard seasons his first two seasons in the league but hasn’t been as good the past two seasons.
It’s good to quit the receiver-by-committee approach, but I just wouldn’t give up a first-round pick for a guy that has slowed down for whatever reason. Of course, there’s no great receivers in this draft, so it’s like he literally is that first-round draft pick.
The bye week is a good time to get rest and regroup. They’re going to need that because this offense needs to get fixed. Luckily, the division is still within the Cowboys’ reach as they’re a game-and-a-half back. They’re going to need to be a little better than mediocre to win it though.
