The Cowboys finished the season third in their division, with their only division wins coming against the fairly awful Redskins (in one of those games, the 'Boys did not score a touchdown, and the other required overtime). The Cowboys gave away big late-game leads to the Jets, Lions and Giants. They lost games they should have won to the Patriots and the Cardinals.
For years the Cowboys have been listed among the league's most talented. For decades they've been the most-watched team in football. Of the seven highest-rated Sunday Night Football games (in the 6-year history of NBC's broadcast), the Cowboys have played in six, including the three highest. It's clear that Dallas does not have to succeed to remain popular. And unfortunately, the culture of Jerry Jones's squad reflects that sentiment perfectly.
Good teams take the talent they have and win games. The Cowboys, for 15 years in a row now, take the talent they have and sell tickets.
I'm not sure I have a silver bullet for fixing the problem, because it's system-wide. It starts with Jerry, and it infects everything below him. His jewel-encrusted stadium, his front-office staff, his coaches, and his players.
I don't think a season and a half is enough to provide a fair assessment of Jason Garrett. Even if it is, I wouldn't think he should be fired for his performance. But I wonder if the organization needs to clean house and start over.
The defense isn't entirely (or even primarily) Rob Ryan's fault. The defense showed flashes of brilliance. And I don't know if there's anything Ryan can do about a professional football player, Abram Elam, wrapping up Ahmad Bradshaw in the backfield for a certain loss, but instead somehow letting him go and run for a touchdown instead. I don't hold Ryan responsible for a 9-year veteran, Terence Newman, being neutralized once runners discovered they simply have to jump in the air to avoid him. I'm not convinced his game plans were always successful (see Eagles 34, Cowboys 7), but when they were, his personnel simply couldn't execute.
This season was worse than you think because even a little bit of mental toughness would have led to 12 or 13 wins, and instead we saw only 8. Tony Romo had a pre-season attitude that made it clear he was ready to take the next step in his career. He was more focused, more mature, and more ready than he's ever been for a season. He had a great year, but he almost single-handedly gave away two games (Jets, Lions)*. Demarcus Ware was in the hunt for most of the year not only to lead the league in sacks, but to break Michael Strahan's single-season sack record, but he mostly disappeared late in the season.
Usually when a team misses the playoffs, they look over the season and coaches determine where they need to get better, how to improve through the draft and through free agency, and how to develop the team toward a more successful next year. The Cowboys have been trying that formula for years. There are trouble spots that need to be addressed for sure, but the Cowboys trouble is not that they need to get more talented. They need to become mentally tougher. They need an intensity and a winning instinct that simply isn't there. How else can you explain completely laying down to a hated division rival like the Eagles twice in one season? How can you explain acting like a win over the Patriots is unnecessary? And how can you explain giving up 21 points in the first half in a game that, practically speaking, is a playoff game, while scoring absolutely zero?
The answer for the Dallas Cowboys cannot be to do what you're supposed to do in the offseason. There needs to be some serious soul-searching. I'm well aware of the explosive abilities and amazing talent of many players on this team, but it has become clear that there is no reason for optimism as a fan. Until the culture of the Cowboys organization takes a dramatic turn, we will not see an impressive ending to any Dallas season.
*Romo's one of the last on my personal list of who's to blame for the crappy bits of this season, so don't think I'm calling him the goat. I do think his mental mistakes in big points of certain games illustrate the cultural problems described in this post.
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