Confidence in Cowboys plummets, plenty of blame to go around for Cardinals debacle

Good times only last for so long. For the Dallas Cowboys, those good times lasted for two weeks. After the Cowboys crushed the New York duo of the Giants and the Jets, the Cowboys were riding high and their fanbase was right there with them. In our surveys on this site, the confidence that the team was headed in the right direction was sky high, with 96% saying they were after Week 1, and 97% saying it after Week 2.

As you might have guessed, those numbers plummeted. When we asked that same question earlier this week, only 46% of fans felt the team was heading in the right direction.

That is what a loss to an 0-2 team will do. The Arizona Cardinals might actually be a better team than we thought they were, but even so, the loss was embarrassing for the Cowboys if they want to be considered true contenders.

So just why did that loss happen? We put five options in front of the Cowboys fanbase and the results were pretty evenly split among three issues.

The largest vote (31%) was for the run defense. Giving up 222 yards on the ground makes that a safe bet. Run defense is the zombie problem that the Cowboys just can’t kill.

Next up at 26% was the coaching/play-calling category. It’s a good bet most of this was around Mike McCarthy’s curious redzone play calls, and not having the team ready to play in general.

And trailing right behind the coaching/play calls was the redzone issues at 25%. Those are probably interrelated with the coaching issues so it all falls into one big basket. Even the run defense can fall into the coaching basket if you consider Dan Quinn in the equation. And we probably should because even great coaches have bad days.

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