The Cowboys were a perfect 8-0 at home last season and had a 16-game win steak at AT&T Stadium heading into January’s playoff date hosting Green Bay. Since then, though, they’ve not just lost five consecutive home games, they’ve gotten humiliated every single time. With Sunday’s 34-6 face plant at the hands of the Eagles, Dallas has now trailed by 20 or more points during each of the five straight home losses. That’s the first time that’s ever happened to an NFL team.
It’s no surprise, then, that there was a whole lot of “bad” and “ugly” in the Week 10 contest and very little “good.” With Dak Prescott on the sideline, the Cowboys offense was positively putrid, and not even Micah Parsons’s return from a high-ankle sprain could pull the Dallas defense out of the dumps. From pointless play calls to a big batch of turnovers, bad tackling, horrible passing, another late-afternoon battle with the sun, and even an inexcusable spelling error, there’s a long list of things that went very wrong for the Cowboys on Sunday.
Here’s our look at the good, the bad, and the ugly from the Birds’ beatdown.
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Bad: Historically bad passing numbers
Forty-nine passing yards. For the entire game. On 29 attempts. An average of 1.5 yards per pass play. Only two receptions that went for double digits (and both, just 10 yards). For all the confidence the Cowboys coaches and teammates said they had in Cooper Rush, the veteran backup did absolutely nothing to prove a shred of it was deserved. Per ESPN’s Todd Archer, the team’s 49 passing yards were the fewest for the Cowboys since 2001. And according to The 33rd Team, the performance ranks in the worst 1% of all the NFL’s passing games ever.
Ugly: Turnovers become comedy of errors
Rush’s dropped snap in the first quarter that put the Eagles in the red zone. Ezekiel Elliott’s goal-line fumble, his first career red zone turnover. Trey Lance’s egregious interception. Take your pick; each of the Cowboys’ five giveaways was atrocious, but none was more ridiculous than Rush’s fumble at the end of the third quarter. Right tackle Terence Steele was in position to recover, but instead of falling on the ball, the 310-pounder inexplicably tried to scoop it and run. In the process, he denied fullback Hunter Luepke a shot at it, and both ultimately watched the ball skitter away to Philadelphia linebacker Zack Baun. A close second: Jake Ferguson’s fourth-quarter fumble, which squandered a one-handed grab… and then, to everyone’s horror, nearly took out the legs of an already-injured Dak Prescott, who was standing way too close on the sideline. The Cowboys’ minus-10 turnover differential is among the NFL’s worst, and they seem to be finding new ways to add to it.
Good: Overshown offering hope for pass rush’s future
The second-year linebacker out of Texas is more than making up for his lost rookie season. Overshown has been the lone bright spot on the Dallas defense this year and is providing a tantalizing preview of what the pass-rush unit could be. Overshown looked like he alone was playing on turbo mode for most of the game, racking up two sacks, two QB hits, and two TFLs, and leading the team in tackles… all despite leaving the contest midway through the third quarter. He reported from the locker room afterward that he’s fine and will be “ready to go next week.” Micah Parsons is a bone fide beast, but Overshown could be making a push for the title of most impactful player on the Cowboys defense.
Bad: Another mid-game meltdown
When Elliott fumbled at the goal line in the second quarter to unceremoniously end a 13-play, 63-yard drive, he fumbled away more than what was to be a go-ahead Cowboys touchdown. The proverbial bottom fell out of the Dallas offense from that moment on. A subsequent Philly fumble set up Rush & Co. on the six-yard-line, but they managed just one yard on three plays and had to settle for a field goal. After that, Dallas turned in three straight three-and-outs, then three straight possessions that ended in a very quick turnover. From the moment of Elliott’s fumble to the start of the fourth quarter, the Cowboys were particularly inept: five possessions, 16 plays run, zero first downs made, three three-and-outs, five total yards gained.
Ugly: Renewed debate over curtains
The unique east-west orientation of AT&T Stadium is a well-covered topic within Cowboys Nation. And on Sunday, the late-afternoon setting sun pouring in through the massive glass doors and walls was once again a deciding factor in a game. While it appeared that Eagles quarterback Jalen Hurts had the sun in his eyes on a few passes, it was painfully obvious that the blinding glare was directly responsible for CeeDee Lamb being unable to haul in a touchdown pass just before halftime. Owner Jerry Jones has bristled before when asked about using the facility’s curtains (which do exist) during games; he has always waved off the suggestion without so much as a second thought. Put it in the same bucket as fan tours through the locker room, helicopters landing on the practice field, and an interview-happy owner who insists on also playing general manager: it’s just one of the many quirks of playing for the Cowboys that may make the job more difficult… but will never change.
Good: Diggs shows vintage form on early INT
Diggs has had an up-and-down season. When he wasn’t coming under fire for lashing out at a reporter in a postgame exchange or dealing with uncertainty over a calf tear, his numbers have been down. After a Week 1 pick in Cleveland, Diggs hadn’t had an interception since. But on the first play of Sunday’s second quarter, the 26-year-old made an acrobatic play to steal an end-zone target away from Eagles tight end Dallas Goedert. It was reminiscent of the moves Diggs was making on a near-weekly basis in 2021, when he led the league with 11 picks. The interception could have been a turning point that put the Cowboys on a go-ahead scoring drive and perhaps changed the course of the game, but the offense wasted the effort with one of five three-and-outs. Takeaways have been hard to come by for Mike Zimmer’s crew this season, but for one brief moment, Diggs flashed back to better days with a highlight-reel theft.
Bad: Tackling allergy spreading among defense
Poor tackling has reached epidemic proportions in Dallas. Over the course of nine games, fans have witnessed questionable to downright bad efforts from multiple Cowboys defenders. The spotlight has been on Donovan Wilson, Trevon Diggs, Malik Hooker, and others over the course of nine games. Sunday was Eric Kendricks’s turn. The veteran, on several occasions, seemed content to plant his feet and wait for a Philadelphia ball carrier to reach him rather than race to the point of attack. It led to him getting juked and even blown up more than once. The Cowboys defense once prided itself on swarming to the ball and being overtly physical; their recent return to throwing shoulders, pushing, and herding even had Tony Romo calling the unit’s play “soft” from the CBS booth.
Ugly: Misspelling history
Apparently, not even the franchise’s greatest legends are safe from catching strays during this abysmal 2024 season. With the Cowboys sporting their red helmet stripes in advance of Veterans Day, the team also honored past military members and service heroes in a video montage shown at the stadium. Among them, the man who coached the Cowboys for their first 29 years of existence, took them to five Super Bowls, and remains the fifth-winningest head coach in league history. But in paying tribute to U.S. Army Air Corps veteran and WWII combat bomber pilot Tom Landry, the Cowboys- unbelievably- spelled his last name wrong. It seems just par for the course this year.
Good: Dowdle quietly hitting stride
Twelve carries for 53 yards isn’t normally a rushing performance to write home about. But with as bad as the Dallas ground attack has looked for most of 2024, Dowdle’s 4.4 yards per carry on Sunday seemed to cement his status as the team’s best backfield option. The sixth-year man out of South Carolina doubled Elliott’s carry total for Week 9 and nearly tripled his yardage; his 19-yard rumble in the second quarter was the Cowboys’ longest play from scrimmage all afternoon. Dowdle has averaged four yards per carry or better in every game he’s played this season except Week 1; his 4.5-yard average on the season has him ranked 20th in the NFL, ahead of names like David Montgomery, Alvin Kamara, Tony Pollard, Najee Harris, Breece Hall, and Kareem Hunt.
