Heading into their Week 9 game against the Atlanta Falcons, the Dallas Cowboys are in a bad place. They are 3-4 and have lost back-to-back games. They do not do anything well: Their pass offense is not efficient and their run game is non-existent. They cannot stop the run and teams can throw the ball to wherever they want.
They are tied for 24th in the NFL in point differential. Two of their three wins have come against teams (Browns, Giants) that are otherwise a combined 2-10 on the season, and two of their three wins (Giants, Steelers) have come by a combined eight points. They were blown out by the Saints and Lions, and blown out for the significant majority of their losses to the Ravens and 49ers before cutting them down to one score in garbage time.
Along with the decrepit Carolina Panthers and New England Patriots, they are one of only three teams ranked inside the bottom 10 in EPA per play on both offense and defense, according to Tru Media. In other words, they are not a good football team. And in more ways than one.
Cowboys owner Jerry Jones was asked during his weekly radio appearance how he felt about the struggles of right guard Zack Martin and right tackle Terence Steele, but he went on one of his usual extended answers, preferring instead to focus on the entire team rather than the right side of the offensive line.
"I think we're having a rougher go than I anticipated. Let's put it like that. Let's don't couple that with just those two," Jones said, via ESPN. "But having me in the loop has to be there. It is rougher and I did not anticipate the challenges that we're having with this team, but I am reminded of teams that I've seen that have had a lot of success and put themselves in position to take a shot and they were 3-4."
The problem with this formulation, of course, is that the Cowboys having a rough go was entirely predictable. They lost Tyron Smith, Tyler Biadasz, Tony Pollard, Michael Gallup, Dorance Armstrong, Dante Fowler Jr., Leighton Vander Esch, Stephon Gilmore and Jermaine Kearse -- all starters or significant contributors from last year's team. To replace them, the team ... drafted a trio of rookies (Tyler Guyton, Cooper Beebe, Marshawn Kneeland) and signed a pair of aging veterans (Ezekiel Elliott, Eric Kendricks), and that's pretty much it. You don't get better by doing that. And the results on the field show that they are, indeed, not better.
Jones acknowledged the issues the team has on the offensive line and connected them to the team's problem with turnovers, albeit while not necessarily acknowledging the reason those issues are in place.
"When I look at the whys that we're here, I really have a tough time getting past just sheer youth, sheer inexperience in the offensive line and I have a tough time getting past that turnover [ratio]," Jones said. "I'm telling you when you look at that and knowing what turnovers will do for you, we've had through seven games, we, the Cowboys, have turned the ball over 13 times. The entire year last year we didn't turn it over but 16 times. Thirteen times we turned it over. ... It's really a plus that we've won three games."
Naturally, Jones has confidence that his team will turn it around, essentially because Dak Prescott is good and Mike McCarthy won a Super Bowl in 2010.
"First of all, I have seen the players that are out on the field do what I'm talking about doing that would address turnovers or do address having your communication in your offensive line, improving your running game, improving your protection," Jones said. "I have seen Dak make the kinds of plays that would cause us to have a different turnover ratio, for instance. So your question is right on, but I have seen these guys do it. I know that Mike [McCarthy], I know the caliber of coach he is. He's one of the highest percentage winning/losing coaches that's been in the NFL. And he's won a Super Bowl. So when you've seen it done in football, then you know they can do it. Then that gives you reasons to say what I say and that is that we can get better."
His team has 10 more games to prove him right -- or, more likely, wrong.
