This season has felt broken for a very long time now.
The Cowboys have now lost five straight games, with the season falling into utter disarray ever since their gutsy win in Pittsburgh over the Steelers that seemingly signaled a positive shift in the team’s overall trajectory. Of course, it’s hard to talk about this current slide without acknowledging all of the injuries that have plagued this roster.
Micah Parsons missed that game in Pittsburgh, as did DeMarcus Lawrence, and then missed the next three games. Lawrence still hasn’t returned, and his replacement – rookie Marshawn Kneeland – almost immediately landed on the injured reserve in that Steelers game. Kneeland has had his practice window activated now and may return soon, as is the case for DaRon Bland, who has yet to play all year. But because this season is seemingly cursed, all these players started getting healthy right when Dak Prescott went down for the year, making their returns largely meaningless.
It’s easy to blame this lost season on the injuries, but the Cowboys didn’t exactly look all that crisp before players started dropping like flies either. That shouldn’t be a surprise after a lackluster (to put it nicely) offseason led to what some deemed the worst roster of the Mike McCarthy era. So is this losing streak more about all the injuries or just a symptom of the team being set up to fail by their front office? Our own Tom Ryle and David Howman have some thoughts.
Tom: Looking at the roster even before players started getting hurt, I thought that eight wins just might be the ceiling for this team. The offensive line was suspect, the running game had no clear lead back, and the defense also had some big question marks, starting with the interior of the line where run games either get handled or gash you. Once again the aversion to using free agency to really improve things was in play, and it boded ill.
All that has come into play, and the rampant injuries have just made it worse. But I still think the team was going to miss the playoffs even with good health. Mike McCarthy was dealt a bad hand to play, and I cannot dismiss my suspicions it was deliberate.
Now the only race of any importance for Dallas is how close to the top of the draft order they can get. We know Jerry Jones is a firm believer in building through the draft, and it looks like he will get a chance, although the odd decision to trade a fourth-round pick for Jonathan Mingo, coming off IR, doesn’t help. We are left to wonder just what Jerry said he was all in on, but we don’t have to speculate about how this season will end. The Cowboys will be at home for the playoffs. And I think that was going to happen in any case.
David: While I’m fully inclined to believe that Jerry Jones intentionally set Mike McCarthy up to fail, I also don’t believe that things were going to completely come off the rails as they have. We had similar conversations heading into the 2022 season, and the front office put a similarly lackluster product on the field, but McCarthy was able to will that team to 12 wins even with Dak Prescott missing five games. It helped, though, that the Cowboys defense was fully intact and playing well while Prescott was out.
Looking at this year, the Cowboys entered the season with questions but also potential answers. Rico Dowdle has rightfully emerged as the top back, though it seems that McCarthy encountered some unexpected hurdles in properly prioritizing him in the offense, and both Tyler Guyton and Cooper Beebe looked genuinely good in the preseason. Honestly, both rookies have been solid, especially when you account for the fact that neither of them played their current position in college. What nobody accounted for on this offensive line was Zack Martin’s significant drop-off in production or even Terence Steele, who’s always been suspect but not terrible in pass protection, leading the league in sacks allowed through 11 weeks.
And then there’s the defense. They got their doors blown off by the Saints and Ravens, one of which is par for the course all throughout the league. Then they lost their best player and just about every other edge rusher behind him. The cornerback spot in Bland’s place has been a revolving door, which isn’t surprising given how hard it is to find great corners in today’s age. And all of that came on top of the whole defense still learning and adjusting to a pretty radically different scheme with Mike Zimmer. In recent weeks, we’ve seen the defense flash some genuine promise, though it’s far too little and far too late.
If the Cowboys had been just a little bit healthier during this stretch, I think they squeak out wins against the Falcons, Eagles, and Texans and are sitting here today at 6-4.
Tom: I still think that is too optimistic for what this squad was, even at their peak. We pretty much all agreed the roster going into this season was a step backwards from the prior year. I’m very unimpressed with the jobs both McCarthy and Zimmer have done. Both seem to need a full strength roster to work with, and Zimmer needed to do a better job getting his unit up to speed.
But the thing that has emerged for me so far is that they have made a huge mistake with Dak Prescott’s contract. It is hard to argue that injuries now seem inevitable for him. Worse, the evidence is that he has lost the mobility that was so important. With it, he was clearly a top 10 quarterback and should have been capable of doing more than he has in the playoffs. Now, he just cannot escape pass rushes the way he used to and is no longer a real threat to take off and get it done with his legs. Add in the weaknesses of the receiving corps outside of CeeDee Lamb, the apparent tension between star receiver and quarterback, and some less-than-impressive play-calling by McCarthy, this offense was rather feeble even before Cooper Rush took the reins.
Now they are handcuffed to Prescott. Which is going to raise some really difficult questions about what they do going forward.
David: I couldn’t disagree more. Mobility has never been a big part of Prescott’s game, and his best years in the league – I’m specifically looking at 2019 and 2023 – saw some of his highest pass attempt totals and fewest scramble totals. He has the mobility, even now, to work the pocket and pick up yards on scrambles when he has to, but Prescott’s game is, at its core, based in the pocket.
He was cooking on a weekly basis in that approach last year, but this year was different largely because he seemed to be out of sync with CeeDee Lamb. Their connection never felt quite right this year, which threw everything else off. As we saw last year, the offense can get humming when those two are on the same page, but Prescott lacked the weapons outside of Lamb to do much when they’re not clicking. Last year, they clicked almost all season long. This year? Hardly at all.
But going back to my optimistic take on the last three games. The Falcons loss came by one score, and that game featured Prescott leaving early with his injury. Few teams can replace their quarterback mid-game and still win, unless they’ve already built a sizable lead. Against the Eagles, it was a one-score game at halftime and the levee only broke as a result of a back-breaking turnover from Cooper Rush. Then against the Texans, it was a similar story, with the Cowboys trailing by just 10 at the start of the fourth quarter.
When you consider how historically great Prescott has been during comeback attempts, I find it hard to believe the Cowboys don’t at least have a much better chance of winning those three games, if not winning them outright, with him under center from start to finish.
Tom: Yeah, we just see things through different lenses. Hanging close only to get blown out late is not exactly a plus in my book. And don’t forget that a touchdown on the very first play of the Texans game was called back – and then they marched right down the field.
I don’t know what happened between Prescott and Lamb, but it certainly hints at something else going on with the morale and cohesiveness of the team. And we all remember the sentiments Prescott was caught expressing on the sidelines.
With the starting QB out for the year, this is just a broken team. And I will not change my mind that the fractures were going to happen at some point even with fewer injuries. This team was just not built to win this season.
David: No argument there. The offseason approach was embarrassing, but I can’t say it was entirely out of the ordinary. That’s been their MO for a while now, and it doomed Jason Garrett quite a few times. McCarthy was unique in that he had proven capable of sustained success in spite of it all. But even he had his breaking point, though I think this team would’ve remained competitive a bit longer without so many injuries to their top players.
One thing is clear: whoever takes the top job next will need to first have an honest conversation with Jerry about what they need from him in order to succeed. Conservative approaches to roster building is what puts you in this spot, where a couple of poorly-timed injuries can completely derail the season. And as much as I might hate to admit it, I’m not sure there’s a soul out there who can have that conversation with the owner and actually see it change as a result.
