Nevertheless, let's consider this:
Prior to the season, expert analysis concluded that Dallas would finish this season anywhere between 7-9 and 10-6. That's pretty much what the expectations of the team were before any football had been played.
Week 1: Dallas beats Tampa Bay handily. Fine. That's what they were supposed to do.
Week 2: Dallas gets beat by the New York Giants (at the time considered to be one of the top two or three teams in the league) on a last-second field goal. All of a sudden, Dallas is terrible. They completely sucked, and Tony Romo will never be anything but a turnover machine who can't win a meaningful game. Among experts, the Cowboys stock plummets.
Week 3: Dallas defeats the 0-2 Carolina Panthers without too much drama on Monday night. Fine. That's what they were supposed to do.
Week 4: Dallas is beaten by the 3-0 (now 6-0) Denver Broncos at Invesco after giving up a late touchdown and then being unable to punch in a score even after driving all the way down the field in the final 1:46. The Cowboys are in "serious trouble" and aren't playing very well this season. Can't really do anything right. Among experts, the Cowboys stock plummets.
Week 5: Dallas defeats the winless Kansas City Chiefs in overtime. (I'll concede, you shouldn't need overtime to beat Kansas City if you're a real contender, but note a few things: 1. In the NFL, wins are tough to come by. Witness last week's Philadelphia Eagles collapse against the just-about-as-bad-as-the-Chiefs Oakland Raiders. 2. The size of the win means absolutely nothing when the season ends. 3. If you watched the game, Dallas never really felt like they were in real danger of getting beat. Even in overtime, when Kansas City won the toss and started with the ball, they never threatened to score.) Since it was such an ugly win, Dallas is mistake-prone and still can't get their act together. Among experts, if there was much lower to go, the Cowboys stock would have likely plummeted.
Week 6: Dallas has a bye. They sit at home and get healthy. Every other NFC East team gets beaten, including a humiliating Eagles loss to the Raiders, and a perhaps even more humiliating (they got KILLED) Giants loss to the Saints. Even so, Dallas slips two spots in ESPN's power rankings.
Preceding today's game against the Falcons: The Cowboys are a team stuck in the mud with a lack of playmaking at receiver, an inconsistent defense, an "Aw shucks" southern coach who should have remained a defensive coordinator for someone, and a Hollywood quarterback who'd rather have his picture taken than go a game without turning the ball over.
I guess what I mean by all this is, isn't this exactly what we should've expected thus far from a 7-9 to 10-6 team? Their losses were to unbeaten teams (Giants, Broncos), and both were extremely close, winnable games. I understand that the Cowboys are one of those franchises (like the New York Yankees) that completely polarizes people, but if a team is more or less mediocre, shouldn't they beat bad teams and lose to good teams? In other words, should we really have expected anything more from these guys?
Today Dallas beat a very good team, the Atlanta Falcons. The defense caused problems for Matt Ryan all day long. Tony Romo was something like 21-29 for 311 yards, 3 touchdowns, and no interceptions. The talk of the team is receiver Miles Austin who, in the last two games, has 16 catches for 421 yards. Re-read that. It's not a typo. That's an average of more than 26 yards per catch. The Falcons were 4-1 entering this game, and showing every sign of being a serious contender in the NFC race. Dallas defeated them 37-21, playing an all-around great game. Shouldn't this be the first thing that really surprises us about this team, and will they get credit for being, frankly, a little better than we thought? The Cowboys are now a game behind the Giants for first place in the NFC East (which will be either 1.5 games or just .5 games after the Giants game ends this evening).
I'll continue to be optimistic.
No comments:
Post a Comment