Are the Dallas Cowboys For Real? Yeah, Real Bad.

The Dallas Cowboys have only lost two games and are tied for first place in the NFC East. There is a little bit of talk going around that the Cowboys will make a strong run in the playoffs. Whoa! Hold the horses because the Dallas Cowboys have won two games in a row, against supposedly tough teams, the Atlanta Falcons and the Seattle Seahawks. Let me start with the Seattle Seahawks, a team that I actually did expect to rebound from last year and win the NFC West, but the reality is that I was incorrect. They were 4-12 last year and so far this year they are 2 – 5. So everyone’s pumped that the Cowboys beat a 2 win team? I hope not. The Seattle Seahawks have better pieces in place than what they had last year, but those pieces may have only helped them win six games instead of four.

Now to the Atlanta Falcons, they had a great year last year and everyone jumped on the bandwagon. I’ve been saying all along that Matt Ryan is a decent quarterback but that he’d have his weaknesses exposed more his second year and that is exactly what’s happened. Last year he had 11 interceptions for the entire year; this year he already has 9 interceptions. This year the Falcons will probably win the NFC South, but they are 4-3, which is not a great record. At least it shouldn’t be enough to get people talking about a great playoff run.

As for the other teams they’ve beaten this year, you have the Tampa Bay Buccaneers with an impressive WINLESS record. No need to expand further. Then they beat the Kansas City Chiefs. Ugh, one win this year. I thought that Todd Haley was going to figure something out for that team, so far, their only win is against a 2 win Washington Redskins who have only beat the paltry Rams and Lions.  The Cowboys only other win was against the Carolina Panthers, a team that I felt was really going to play good this year, but I’m putting the blame solely on quarterback Jake Delhomme. So they have not won against very good competition. In fact, the two losses they have are against the only two good teams they’ve played this year.

Another factor in the Dallas Cowboys not being as good as advertised is that Tony Romo has yet to live up to his hype. He continues to make key mistakes in big games and at times even struggles in regular season games. I do like his laid-back attitude, and I know he says that he is hard on himself, but is anyone else in the Dallas Cowboys organization hard on Tony Romo? During the Cowboys summer camp Coach Wade Phillips was asked under what circumstances would he bench Tony Romo; he responded that Tony is better than 90% of the quarterbacks in this league even on his worse day. Someone followed up and asked him if that even included days he throws for 4 interceptions. Wade Phillips response was “yes”. So, there doesn’t appear to be much from outside sources to pressure Romo to improve.

Speaking of coaching problems, everyone’s ecstatic about Miles Austin playing so well the past couple of games, uh, why did they have to play a quarter of a season to realize the talent they have there. He played very well last year, in training camp and in preseason. If what Patrick Crayton says is true, that the coaches didn’t even tell him he was getting benched, then maybe they forgot to tell Miles Austin that he was supposed to be the starter in the first place, so they were just correcting a wrong from training camp.

I don’t know which is worse.  Either way the Cowboys coaching staff appears to have problems not counting their defensive and offensive schemes. Before lots of people jump on the Dallas Cowboys bandwagon, keep those points in mind and remember that although  they currently are tied for first in the NFC East, they still could and probably will end up third behind the Philadelphia Eagles and New York Giants…oh, and even if they did make the playoffs, the Cowboys have yet to prove in nearly a decade that they can even win a playoff game.  Let’s see them beat a good team or two before starting to hype the ‘Boys in Big D.