Now that’s how you start out a season. Go on the road, play a team that is thought to be on the way up, a playoff contender, and beat the snot out of them. The Cleveland Browns played the gracious host as the Dallas Cowboys wrecked their house with impunity. The final score was 28-10 but the actual beatdown was more severe. All the credit goes to the offensive line and Hudson Houck. The Cowboys offense was a machine, much like The Terminator, and the Browns were roadkill.
OK, there is some bad news from the game. Marion Barber left with some kind of rib injury and Tony Romo actually got hit a couple of times and ended up with a busted chin and a puffy finger. Also, the Cowboys were amazingly bad in respect to penalties, something they’ll need to clean up. But that even shows how dominant they were, all those penalties and they were still never threatened and simply imposed their will.
Romo looked extremely sharp except for his one poor choice when we were about to score another TD. With pressure coming, he chose not to take the sack and not to throw it out of the endzone, instead lofting an easy INT. But outside of that he was the model of perfection as he used Terrell Owens, Jason Witten and Patrick Crayton to slice-and-dice the Browns secondary. On most plays, the offensive line gave Romo all the protection he needed and he made good use of it. Marion Barber was also having a great game until his injury, but rookie sensation Felix Jones came on and kept the attack potent. He scored a TD and helped burn the clock on a long drive by the Cowboys to close the game.
The defense really needs to get some props, too. They held the high-powered Browns offense to 10 points at their stadium. It was tough to get pressure on Derek Anderson because of his good line and he gets rid of the ball quickly. But they held the trio of Jamal Lewis, Braylon Edwards and Kellen Winslow in check and the secondary, even without Terence Newman, held up on the day.
A few stats to chew on, the Cowboys were 8 for 11 on third down. They had 30 first downs in the game and 487 net yards. They only gave up 11 first downs and held the Browns to 205 net yards.
The Cowboys proved that their stacked roster is no paper tiger and thrashed the Cleveland Browns. Now, let’s pray MB3 is healthy and bring on the Eagles, who by the way crushed the Rams today.
Boxscore.
