Season-Ending Answers on The Day After
By Matt Cordon (kh). Filed in Dallas Cowboys News in Brief, Questions Waiting for Answers |
Remember the made-for-TV movie, The Day After, showing the effects of a nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union? The moral of that story: nuclear war destroys everything, radiation sickness is just as bad as dying in the blast, and altogether nothing good comes from it. I’m sure there were other morals and lessons (e.g., when a blast goes off in the atmosphere, all electronic devices, including cars, no longer work), but that’s what I remember. Want more on this fun little movie– see Wikipedia.
So what does that have to do with the Cowboys loss? Um….I’m not really sure, except that I’ve spent the day thinking, “It’s the day after, and we still lost…. It’s the day after, and we still lost….” In reading the boards until much too late last night, I know very well that misery loves company.
Two things I’m thinking right now, among other things:
(a) It probably would have been better to have given up a touchdown on the Terry Glenn fumble in the fourth quarter than to have given up a safety. That cut the Dallas lead to 20-15, and the Seahawks ensuing touchdown gave them a one-point lead. If the score had been tied at 20, it would have been a slightly different story when the Cowboys got the ball back.
(b) The third-down play to Jason Witten, where the ball was first placed at the one but, after review, was placed at the 1 1/2-yard line, is one that haunts the Cowboys as much as the botched field goal. If Dallas converts that, then it can run down the clock and kick the field goal on third down with much less pressure. Even with a botch, the Cowboys get another chance. But it didn’t happen, and I am not certain that Dallas would have won had they made that kick. Josh Brown is one of the best clutch kickers in the league, and the Seahawks would have had more than a minute to get into field goal range.
Anyway, friends, here are the answers to yesterday’s questions:
(1) Can the Cowboys find a way to generate any pressure? The 4-3 look seemed to work a little bit better last week, but it still wasn’t enough. The ineffectiveness of the blitz has gone far beyond head-scratching, and these ends (Spears, Canty) are anything but awe-inspiring. Something needs to change, either now or next season.
It was better. Dallas missed opportunities for sacks, but at least Hasselbeck didn’t have all day to throw.
(2) Running game? Oh, running game? Are you there, running game? The two-headed monster of Jones and Barber has turned into a two-headed mouse, with the two gaining a combined 40 yards or so in the past two games. Nothing more needs to be said.
Julius Jones had his best game in more than a month, rushing for 112 yards on 22 carries. His long run in the fourth quarter drive that ended on the botched field goal could have set up the win. We’re not going to revisit that.
(3) Can the Cowboys take advantage of a banged-up Seattle secondary? Quite a bit has been made of this, but I wouldn’t simply assume that Dallas will be able to throw all over the place on the Seahawks. That solution would be just too easy.
Not really. Mickey Spagnola addressed this today:
So I’m guessing everyone wants to know why the Cowboys weren’t able to exploit the Seahawks’ two backup corners having to start for the injured Marcus Trufant and Kelly Herndon. Well, the Seahawks played their safeties over the top, doubling both Terrell Owens and Terry Glenn, forcing Tony Romo to look elsewhere on his reads. But doing that left the middle of the field open, and why the Cowboys were getting the ball to Jason Witten and Patrick Crayton. Also why there was running room for Julius Jones (112) yards. But, their gamble paid off, holding the Cowboys to just 20 points – Terrell Owens and Terry Glenn to six combined catches – and other than the kickoff return for a touchdown in the second half, just three points the final two quarters.
(4) Does Tony Romo need that second hand for something other than to cover the football? I haven’t played quarterback (at least in organized tackle football) for 17 years, but I don’t recall it being a great advantage to be able to run around with only one hand on the ball. I do, however, remember that it was quite dangerous.
He needed that second hand on the field goal attempt, now didn’t he?
He also had a pretty bad fumble deep in Dallas territory in the third quarter, but fortunately Julius Jones recovered it.
(5) Are we seeing the last of Bill Parcells and/or Terrell Owens?
How knows? At least two D/FW commentators think Parcells might be gone.
Now it’s time to let Bill Parcells out of his misery.
Sure, the Cowboys had a chance to win Saturday night. A good chance, in fact.
Romo’s bobbled snap on what would have been a go-ahead field goal from extra-point range will live in Cowboys’ infamy.
The fact is the Cowboys didn’t win.
The small picture says to blame it on Romo or on a defense that couldn’t make a big stop at the end after playing its best game since November.
The big picture points to Parcells.
The fact is that for the fourth straight year, a Parcells team got worse as the season wound down, not better.
And the educated guess is that Parcells’ days in Dallas are over.
I expect him to announce his resignation fairly soon, even though he said he had no plans to meet with owner Jerry Jones this week.
Jones more likely has plans to meet with him.
Jones is greatly disappointed in Parcells and the job he has done – or not done – in his fourth season.
“Two or three games ago, I’d have told you I thought [Parcells] would be back next season for sure,” Cowboys vice president Stephen Jones had told me on the flight out Saturday morning. “And if we win, I still think he will.
“If we lose… I just don’t know.”
Parcells may not even know for sure yet. But I can guess which way he’s leaning.
He walked as slowly leaving the field Saturday night as I’ve ever seen a coach walk… like maybe he knew he was doing it for the last time.
“I did the best I could this season,” Parcells said. “It wasn’t quite good enough.
“It’s tough. It’s frustrating because we were in position to win the game.”
Jones and Parcells said they will give it a week before sitting down to discuss the future.
“I want him back,” Jones said. “I want Bill back as our coach. We’ll sit down and talk about that.”
If Parcells did indeed do some walking when he got back to Dallas this morning, I suspect there was a lot on his mind and much to remember…
Games he’s won and games he’s lost…
Players he’s coached and come to love…
Moments of glory and moments, like Saturday night’s, he’d just as soon forget.
A coach lives and dies in those moments, and Bill Parcells did a lot of dying Saturday night.
Maybe for the last time.
(6) Prediction: Forget it. The Cowboys can win this game, but they will have to turn a number of things around and also hope for Seattle mistakes to do so. Any prediction here would be a hopeful guess.
Yep….. yep…… yep.
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One of the best posts of the year comes from Grizz at Blogging the Boys:
Everything about this year’s team was unfulfilled promises. Nothing ended up being as good as advertised. Within a 15 minute span, all of the Cowboys failings were on display. Poised on the brink of scoring a TD that would’ve have given them an 11-point lead with 10 minutes left in the game, they couldn’t gain half a yard. An offensive line that was supposed to be physically intimidating at the beginning of the year was beat back by a smaller defense. True to form, even the coaches were complicit in this failure. Instead of calling a QB sneak like most of the known universe, Bill Parcells elected to hand it off. Replays show an easy hole for Romo between Andre Gurode and Kyle Kosier, but like most of the year, this team wouldn’t take what was given to them.
Next, it was the offense’s turn to inflict damage, on themselves. The defense had just gotten off the field with a brilliant goal line stand that left the Seahawks empty-handed and on the brink of elimination. Terry Glenn caught a pass, immediately fell, and eventually fumbled, all leading to a safety. Dallas is sitting on a seven point lead with 6:32 left in the game so they throw a safe pass to one of their most dependable receivers, a guy who never fumbles. Like all their other broken promises, he fumbled.
A defense that was under fire for the last month finally started to fulfill its promise by playing an outstanding game. Now, they were backed up to the wall, and needed to make a stand. The offense had left them at a disadvantage after the safety because Seattle got the ball at midfield. You can’t blame this defense for the loss, but they couldn’t make the big play when the time presented itself. The Seahawks went through them like Paris Hilton goes through boyfriends. In just over two minutes Dallas had coughed up a seven point lead to fall behind by one point.
Finally Romo, the guy who had so much promise when he first started playing, was once again going to show that promise, he was going to make us all believe again, and he did. He marched his team down to the 2-yard line and the winning FG. Redemption was at hand for an entire team, an entire organization, an entire fan base. In the blink of an eye it was over. I went from disbelief that he fumbled the snap, to hope beyond all hope that he was going to run it in, to total devastation.
Ah, total devastation. That’s what The Day After has to do with this.
