We’ve looked at how to fix what ails the Cowboys in the Front Office and the Coaches Room. But there’s still more work to be done on the field of play.
No single room is immune from blame in the Cowboys’ postseason woes. We start with the position that, unfairly or not, shoulders most of the blame. With this post we take a look at the quarterback position.
THE MAN UNDER CENTER
The quarterback, usually, gets the biggest paycheck on an NFL team. He’s the straw that stirs the drink, as the saying goes. If the quarterback can’t get the job done it really doesn’t matter what the other 10 offensive players are doing.
With very few exceptions – the 2000 Ravens and the 2002 Buccaneers – a team will not win a championship without a franchise quarterback.
Since the retirement of Troy Aikman, the Cowboys have had two franchise quarterbacks.
Tony Romo was solid for the most part in the regular season. But the man was snakebit in the playoffs.
A football with more Crisco on it than a roadside café uses in a year in Seattle. Patrick Crayton alligator-arming a sure touchdown pass. And yes, Dez caught that ball in Green Bay.
Aside from the disaster in Minneapolis in 2010, Romo did everything he could to get Dallas to an NFC title game but came up short.
DAK PRESCOTT
The man who replaced Romo, Dak Prescott, has posted very good regular season numbers.
He’s led the team to four playoff appearances in his seven seasons. But, like Romo, he hasn’t gotten it done when it matters.
Compounding the issue for Prescott, even though they made the playoffs and beat Tampa Bay, he regressed in 2022.
Despite playing three fewer games, he tied Davis Mills in Interceptions (15) and Pick Sixes (3).
Making matters worse, Prescott’s turnovers seemed to come at the absolute worst time. Up 28-14 with 40 seconds remaining in the half, Prescott throws a pick to set up a Bears field goal. The Cowboys overcame the error, but the play gave the Bears life.
The very next game against Green Bay, Prescott throws two first-half interceptions. Instead of a 14-0 lead, they go into halftime tied at 14. The Packers go on to win in overtime.
The loss to Jacksonville in overtime a few weeks later? Another Prescott pick sets up a Jags momentum-changing score in the second half. Then came the pick six in overtime to end the game.
Then the season-ending loss to the 49ers. Two picks that took at least three points off the board, set up six points for San Francisco, and gave the 49ers momentum they never gave back.
Yes, in all of these examples, other things happened that impacted the game. But if the quarterback is this off, and it keeps occurring, wins are harder to come by.
THE CLOCK IS TICKING
Prescott enters his eighth season in 2023. This has to be his do-or-die season.
He cannot be careless with the ball anymore. He cannot miss wide-open receivers in crucial moments, as he did in the 49ers loss. He cannot force the ball into areas where no window exists.
In the playoff win over Tampa Bay, he pulled the ball down and ran for positive yards. This needs to be his default mode in 2023. Live to fight another down and stop playing Hero ball.
THE SOLUTION
In a perfect world, without the salary cap, Prescott would be cut or traded. According to Spotrac, Prescott carries a $49 million cap hit into 2023. His cap hit is $39 million in 2024.
So cutting him, or trading him, is off the table. For now.
But Dallas needs to make it clear to him that 2023 is his make-it-or-break-it year. Anything less than an NFC title game appearance is unacceptable.
If he doesn’t get the job done? Then the Cowboys’ first-round pick in 2024 had better be Dak Prescott’s replacement.
I’ve said many times that I like Dak BUT some things are starting to concern me!! I’ve noticed that these last two seasons (post injury) he doesn’t run as much and he seems to not see the field and find the open receivers! Hopefully all this will change this next season! It sure looks bad when there are young guys that have only been in the league a few years and have their team competing for the SB each year!
Prescott sees the field just fine; very well, in fact, it you ask scouts or look at data. He absolutely misses some wide open guys, but so does literally everyone else; that’s the trouble with being human and having a limited field of vision at any moment. The source of that perceived issue is that Prescott’s missed receivers get hounded on, which makes them feel more frequent than those of other QBs. This is the same phenomenon that turned Romo into a consensus “choker” for years in the eyes of most – he didn’t fail in the clutch worse than other high end QB, but his frequent clutch successes went overlooked and spotlights were put on his failures. In fact, individually he was more clutch than most, and yet that was spun around the opposite way simply because of the nature of the negative attention that apparently gets put on all Cowboy QBs.
Hello Richard! As you’ve stated Dak Prescott’s goose is cooked if he doesn’t get his act together in the upcoming season. I read somewhere that the Cowboys can cut him in 2024 and save some much needed money to spend elsewhere. They’ll ride with him this year because they have to. Another post season debacle will seal his fate. Dak’s best season has been his rookie season. He looked poised and ready. Now he looks confused and hesitant. I think Kellen Moore had a lot to do with his steady regression. And I feel that Moore was doing things to negatively impact Prescott and McCarthy. I think he felt that if he screwed the offense up enough Jerry Jones would fire McCarthy and hire his ass. Just like his friend Jason Garrett sabotaged the offense under Wade Phillips until he got him fired and he was hired, only to stand around for years looking stupid and clapping his hands. Well Prescott is all out of alibis now with Moore being fired. I think he has the talent and ability to get the job done, bit WILL HE DO IT??? Jerry and Stephen Jones have been made to look like fools for overpaying Dak and with these two who fancy themselves as Football General Manager material, they can’t be happy with Prescott right now. Overpaying, Over Drafting, and Overrated is an accurate description of Jerry and Stephen Jones. They’ll NEVER ADMIT A MISTAKE!!!
You’re just rehashing things you’ve heard unhappy people state that aren’t supported by actual evidence. For example, “never admit a mistake” is completely made up, easily countered by actual moves such as the very early releases of Dez Bryant and Jaylon Smith. They also had a draft bust on their hands in Taco Charlton, and didn’t hesitate to trade him away for cheap once it was clear that he wasn’t coming around.
FYI, Prescott’s individual worst two seasons were his first two. As a rookie, he was very limited by his inexperience and could be penned in when asked to run the show – however, that was also his best offensive supporting cast, especially with the incredible OL that fueled a dominant run game. The OL was never that good again, so even as he steadily improved individually the numbers attached to him were never as high quality as that rookie year when he was only being tasked to supplement that offense.
Since then, he’s evolved to the point that the offense has been able to thrive both as pass first and at high volumes. He’s come fairly close to his rookie year efficiency at much higher volumes a couple of times since, which is much more impressive when you factor in the context.
First, All Pro WR Dez Bryant was a “mistake”. What? He gave the Cowboys EIGHT good to great years (not hardly an “early release”). He was a scape goat cut for DP, when he supposedly suddenly couldn’t “run routes” or “separate” enough for DP. An achilles injury shortened his career.
Second, “Prescott’s INDIVIDUAL worst two seasons were his first two”. ??? His first year he had a 77.6 QBR and a QB rate of 104.9, both the highest ratings in his career. His QBR has pretty much gone DOWN ever since. QBR rating gives “actual evidence” that his LAST two seasons as being two of his worst. Where is this alleged improvement?
In fact, in 2021, he was at a 50 QBR right before that last “forfeit” game of the year against “nothing to play for” Philly, where they pounded 2nd and 3rd string Eagles. That year he had multiple AP/PB Tyron (most of the year), multiple AP/PB Zack and solid La’el on the Oline, WRs Amari, Cee Dee, Gallup, Wilson, TE security blanket Schultz, and RBs Pollard and Zeke. Many NFL QBs probably dream of that supporting cast. PLUS the defense that year gave up LESS THAN 20 points per game.
Only 5 of 65 qbs drafted in the first round since 2000 have won a SB. About 6 of 57 SB’s have been won by qbs who were average or only slightly above. Dak is still good. Be careful, or you could go through the qb mess between Aikman and Romo!
Well said. What some vocal people don’t realize is that it is possible to simultaneously not be elite and yet still be marked than worthy of a franchise committing to. Most “franchise QBs” aren’t elite tier, but teams very much can still win with them.
It’s already hard enough to land a franchise QB…making sure that guy is also elite tier on top of it is little more than luck. Sure, we’d all like Prescott to be outright elite, but that’s demanding too much.
This article makes it sound like interceptions are a long running thing for Prescott. News flash: they were new this past year, and a result of Prescott trying to do too much. One year can be an understandable mistake, and if he learns from that and returns to disciplined ball protection that issue at least can be put to bed. If that’s the new norm, different story.
Of course, the author went as far as to even mention the OT interception against the Jaguars, which was 100% the receiver’s fault, so we can understand that said author is not trying to be fair or accurate here.
In a perfect world, he would be traded or cut now? Well, that says all we need to know about the intent behind this piece. And anyways, in a perfect world Prescott would simply draw from this and, you know, be better next year. He’s led too many high level offense to dismiss as flippantly as this article does.
I’ve never felt that Dak had the “bandwidth” to play the position. The more complicated the defense or the game situation, the more quickly it becomes evident that his mind narrows down to a narrow margin of predictable options. That’s why he’s so easy to pick off. I’d be willing to bet there are defensive coordinators who understand both that fact and just what’s needed to force Dak into that position. Contrast that with Patrick Mahomes. The more complicated the situation, the more creative he gets and the more limitless his thought process seems to be. It’s difficult to defend against that and it’s impossible to develop a coaching strategy that will work from game to game. To put it another way, Mahomes fills whatever container the game gives him, and Prescott is a single-serving container.
Article is about Dak. So the main photo is Troy?
First off I think your take is extreme make or break. The game planning was so predictable tht teams knew our route concepts when we lined up in certain formations. We became so predictable. Kellen Moore game plans when he had Dak moving around, were amazing. But when he had Dak drop back and sit in the pocket at times it left alot to be desired. More importantly I felt like KM lacked understanding of the ebb and flow of a game which hurt us immensely. But before you crucify Dak take a look at Peyton Mannings numbers after 7 seasons their damn near identical or Daks are better. I say tht to say this Mike Mccarthy understands the flow of a game much better than Kellen Moore, and with west coast concepts wrinkled into things Dak will be much better. Stay Tuned..
Hopefully they don’t extent this guy. Agree with you Richard, it should be a make-or-break season. DP is not getting the Cowboys to SB, let alone win it. While he has probably hit his ceiling (if not declining), incoming younger, better QBs have passed him by. He had his best chance when the division was weak, but he couldn’t get the job done. The competition in his own division is getting better now. Hell, the Eagles have now been in the SB twice, winning one, since DP has been with the Cowboys. It’s no longer a weak division. So, status quo or at least try to get better there.