Cowboys @ Chiefs: Winning Beats Losing

… he just can’t keep up w/ the speed rushers anymore. Not sure Free is quite ready, but he’s good enough to bench Flo at times when he f’s up

The defense needs to play a whole game. The line on both sides of the ball need to stop making stupid mistakes (offsides and false starts). Austin is better than people thought, and a “Healthy Choice” is better than a banged up Barber. The talent is there, but the execution is lacking. Like a lot of others here, I think the “Organization” needs to make change. The win feels better than a loss, but if you don’t learn something and take it to the next contest this win will be for naught.

The new Wade is the same as the old Wade. The tougher training camp and focus on eliminating penalties amounted to bubkis.

This team is mentally weak. It self-destructs at every opportunity. There seems to be no discipline. Discipline starts at the top. Until there is a change at the top (in this case GM), there will be no change on the field.

When you look at the talent gap between the Chiefs and Cowboys, there should have been no contest. A disciplined team like the Giants would have pimp-slapped the Chiefs all over the field (which they did). An undisciplined team would commit penalties on 3rd and 26 that let the inferior team stay in the game (which they did).

At least we can’t lose this weekend!

The boys win a game that they should have won. That too is good. The same penalties and same soft defense at the end of the game almost cost the team. Until the team begins to show the focus to detail to prevent stupid penalties and mistakes, we will continue on this Jekyl and Hyde rollercoaster ride. HutHut has some solid points. Jerry really does have to look and see if Wade has the ability to do that. I don’t think so.

It seems they have to get a head start off the line because they are so tubby.

The pessimist in me looks at yesterday’s win and thinks; they needed overtime to get by a winless team. The pessimist in me also thinks; the 3 teams they’ve beaten have a combined record of 1-13.

The optimist in me thinks; their only two losses came down to the wire against a pair of teams that have combined record of 10-0. And for some reason seeing Denver beat New England in all most the exact same way they beat Dallas a week earlier made me feel much better.

This offensive line has got to be the most penalized unit I have ever seen. Man do I wish that could stop. Now!

That the team will play better toward the end of the year this season. Reversal of the recent trend is fine with me.
Let the problems show thier ugly head now so that this team can fight through them and get stronger as the season progresses. And a win is a win…..

-MB3 and Felix should be healthy

-Romo finally has a playmaker at WR to throw to

-Roy Williams will now be in single coverage against teams’ second best CB

-Crayton will go back to what he does best… being a slot receiver

-Our defense has been playing well for the past three games and should continue to play well especially with Sensebaugh back.

I am going to hijack this thread, or attempt to, for a minute. I was at the game. I live in Kansas City and this was my first Dallas Cowboys game I have ever been able to go to. Having grown up in Texas I realize that is a bit odd to some of you, but its just fate.

Anyway, to my point. That game was like a mini home game for the boys. There were so many Cowboys fans at that game that people were calling into the local sports radio station talking about how pissed they were about it. It was truly impressive.

Thanks to the dedicated that drove the distance to attend the game. We truly were the 12th man yesterday on an ugly away game that could have ended very differently. And thanks to Miles Austin for picking yesterday to show up when we desperately needed it.

are to arguably 2 top 5 teams. To compound that, those loses came late in the 4th Q.

Are the Cowboys the Elite of the NFL? No, of course not. They are much closer to the top than most people give them credit for though.

Even when I go into a game with no expectations of winning or losing, this team finds a way to suck me back in. From there they manage to get my blood boiling and heart jumping out of my chest. The ups and downs literally make it feel like a roller coaster ride, but frankly, I think I feel a little safer on a roller coaster.

The thing I am concerned with are the mental mistakes. I don’t think they are fixable. We’ve said it every week for many years now. Fix the penalties, fix the mental blunders, fix this, fix that. But look, they’re still here, and it looks like they’re here to stay. If one of you has a way to cope with this, please, make a fanpost. I need some guidance here! The beer just isn’t cutting it anymore.

but he’s calling for a mid-season replacement at coach:

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/spt/columnists/tcowlishaw/stories/101209dnspocowlishaw.324e180.html

I understand just how difficult it would be to institute a new DC but I think there is someone internally or someone in the world unemployed right now that could run this pitiful 3-4 (internal being the most obvious option). Just giving JG the keys would at least spark something. We are so milquetoast in everything we do that at this point you need something like this. Playing for mediocrity sucks and not a very good strategy. This isn’t like years past – there are easily 8 teams in the NFC right now that are markedly better than us. We can’t just marginally get better.

One year ago, Dallas barely beat the pathetic Bengals after the cowboys played another sloppy mistake prone game. Now one year later, you seen the exact same sloppy mistake prone play by this team in Kansas city, and some people think this is a big win…..really!!!! Beating a chief’s team that has won 2 games in their last thirty is considered a big win, WOW!!!

Teams that don’t learn from their mistakes, are destined to repeat it, and the cowboys are in that pattern.

Some would say, but we lost to two undefeated teams, and we could of won both, ofcource with the if’s and what’s were crackers and nuts theory, heard that all of last two years too, what’s changed???

Since starting out 12-1 in 2007, the cowboys are two games above five hundred, that’s an average team in my book, not anywhere close to being a top notch team

The window is closing for this team, it peaked two years ago, there should of been a coaching overhaul after last season, but Jerry wouldn’t allow his ego to admit his mistake, so the cowboys have wasted another year, this is the lost year for the cowboys. Wholesales changes are coming after this year, a year too late IMO..

yeah, a win is a win, keep telling yourselves that after watching the theater of the absurd yesterday, I heard the same last year after the Bengals games, a win is a win Deke, where did that get us, I’ll tell you, it will be the same this year….another year of poor play and out of the playoffs,

one receiver that has break away speed! !!!Go M.A!!!!! Overstating the obvious , we need to get him the ball more going foward!!

which accounts for some positive results at the collegiate level and below

But in Pro Football it’s Talent #1, Scheme #2 and Execution #3. I am flipping the script on this team and stating it has the ability to lose against anyone – pretty much the opposite of what I’ve believed the prior 2 seasons. How did this happen?

First you have to examine a Defense that consistently fails to rise to the occasion with the game on the line. I would love to see any analysis of the game winning/tying drives by NYG, DEN and KC to understand the scheme and execution. Because if it shows to be neither, then it must be the talent. However, I am inclined to conclude(without that analysis)that it is a combination of Talent(Hamlin now the DB Liability with an ample assist from the Nickle LB)and scheme. And since the former MR Fix-it’s arrival, his supposed strength is our weakness.

At this point, this team has shown me it cannot get out of it’s own way sufficiently to succeed this year. The Hierarchy in the NFL is Elite, Above Average, Good, Mediocre, Bad and Awful. I can’t tell which of the middle 2 we are, but the trend is decidedly down, not up.

I learned after seeing the Colts game, part of the 2 minute drill they practice is handing the ball to the Umpire after a play, to save time because he places it at the LOS for the snap. Would this even occur to our coaching staff ? I’m not even going to ask if we could actually perform that, because I don’t feel our players have the mental wherewithal to pull it off.

And that’s my last point – dumb players make dumb plays. We’ve made soooo many dumb plays for so long, that problem is too obvious. And it persists because you can’t fix Stupid.

So what to do? Try to salvage this year? Of course, but I’m not hopeful. But we can’t saddle next year and the year after with the burden of keeping status quo now. Because it will only extend the underperformance that permeates this organization. I can only conclude that Wade must go. Make Garrett HC so we can find out if we have one. He’ll continue to call the plays, probably elevate Sherman to OC. Make Campo the DC. Is this optimal ? Of course, not, but you can’t let best get in the way of better. More than anything, change the dynamic. Force the team to play smarter, but not tolerating, much less making excuses for dumb play. At least we’ll find out if any part of this current coaching staff is worth keeping or we start all over next year.

You are the voice of reason, sir.

And I always love how you keep things in perspective.

Yes, I too will take the win.

what would you guys think of cutting a player? Didn’t Jimmy Johnson once cut a player mid season who made a big mistake? And not just someone buried on the depth chart but a real contributor?

Maybe something like that could get this team’s attention. If Curtis Johnson gets healthy I’d be interested to see what would happened if Wade cut someone like Barbie after another deer in the headlights tackle attempt.

The best thing about this week’s win is that it comes right before the bye. I say this because honestly, there were some small improvements from the Broncos game (Romo to Austin, pressure on QB), but ultimately there are a good amount of things this team needs to address with the same vigor that it approached fixing the run defense after the Bucs game and the passing game after last week’s Broncos game (I assume there was a lot of extra work put in for the passing game this week based off of Miles Austin’s post game interview). Hopefully this extra week will allow some of these adjustments to be made.

The adjustments that I would like to see made:
1) Tashard has to get more carries early in the game. I love Barber and his style, but I think it is by now obvious that we need to save him a little and utilize him more near the end of games where pass protection and his closing ability are at a premium.

2) Something has to be done about the nickel backer spot. I don’t know if that means allowing Brooking the chance to be a three down LB (which I will say looks pretty attractive right about now) or giving Jason Williams some snaps, but clearly Bobby Carpenter is not the right fit. He is awful in run protection and he has blown many tackles that other LBs would make. I wanted to see what he had, but it is clear that he doesn’t have the necessary ability.

3) With Michael Hamlin just about healthy (at least if you believe the initial prognosis), I would love for him to get some snaps at SS instead of Watkins. By all accounts M. Hamlin has quite a nose for the ball (look at his INT totals at Clemson) and would I think add some playmaking ability to a secondary that will be exploited badly if Watkins has to cover guys like Tony Gonzalez for any length of time.

4) Lastly, I would like to see some experimentation with punt returners. Crayton is (usually) solid and should used around the goal line, but I would be interested to see how a guy like Scandrick with his speed and desire to help the team would do in the PR position. He came out of college labeled an effective punt returner with deceptive speed and I think would provide a nice shot in the arm to special teams (a part of the game he really excels in).

Obviously, all these changes revolve around personnel, and not more obvious changes like less mental mistakes (looking at you Flozell) , but I think these changes could make us better in all phases of the game independent of this team’s IQ.

but what I see is a BAD football team. Top to bottom. At least they aren’t waiting until December to break our hearts.

is anybody else starting to wonder what Marion Barber’s role in this offense is?

The first that has to go:
Wade Phillips.

As a head coach, WP has done little to make this team worthy of a championship. 2007 now seems almost like a fluke. The fact is, the Giants were and still are the better team. Until a SERIOUS head coach comes here and teaches these guys fundamentals, the Cowboys will remain average. Jason Garrett is NOT the answer for HC. He has proven that his play calling can NOT be depended upon at crunch time. I like JG but he’s not head coaching material.

Changes to the Defense. We can’t even seriously entertain the thought of a Super Bowl until our Defense plays to a championship caliber. Yesterday’s OT win at KC shows how far we are from that. DW had at least 20 sacks last year. Where has he been? Yes, I concede the double teaming but a talent like DW HAS to get to the qb for this team to win.

Our secondary is in serious need of revamping. Newman is overrated. He gets beat on the deep ball too much. He’s also injury prone. Look how long Champ Bailey and Darryl Greene have played and HOW they’ve played. Both will be in the Hall one day. Can we say the same about Newman?

Our offensive line needs more discipline. Flozelle Adams needs to go. This team makes too many penalties to be considered a good team. Romo has to be consistent for this team to win. That means NO turnovers and his decision making has to keep improving.

RB’s. Choice, Barber and Jones are great but injury prone. Choice should start at RB with Barber and Jones coming in the rotation. Barber’s running style will not allow him to be a 4 quarter running back. His body simply can’t take the punishment. Choice is also a bruiser but with more speed. Jones is the break-away threat needed in the fourth quarter and along with Barber as the closer, this team should be raking in the yards each game.

WR’s. Austin should be starting along side Crayton. Put RW in the slot and his strength is the slant and fade.

Get a defense to stop the run and let a re-tuned offense do it’s thing, and the "Boys would be unstoppable. Until then, we will be mired in mediocrity.

Roy. Witten marty b.Miles

Felix, choice, barber

That is a whole hell of a lot of options, lot of huge if’s here, I just wish garrett wouldn’t get so cute. Why wasn’t choice in more, why can’t we simply LOB a pass to martellus, I’m not talking back shoulder fade I am talking jump ball!

Man if miles can put together another good game. That opens so many things like 7 in the box for our box 1 on 1 w witten or roy. Please miles, don’t be an abberition(sp?).