Just when the notion of a legitimate dilemma reagrding who should lead the Dallas offense had seemed to fizzle out, a three-time Super Bowl champion has weighed in and renewed the debate.
Cowboys icon Troy Aikman explained Thursday that keeping $40 million man Dak Prescott on the sideline, even once he’s deemed game-ready after a Week 1 thumb fracture, “becomes a real question the organization has to answer” if Dallas is able to beat the Eagles this Sunday to improve to 5-1 and move into a tie for the NFC East lead.
“If they’re winning and they win a big road game against Philadelphia,” Aikman said, “I could see where there is some pause and you say, ‘Well, how exactly do we handle this?’ And I don’t know.”
What sets the Hall of Famer’s comments apart from the TV hot take artists is that Aikman was on the bitterly-disappointed end of a similar quarterback controversy back in 1991.
Second-stringer Cooper Rush has been under center for four straight Cowboys victories, but he hasn’t done much at the quarterback position. The Dallas offense has yet to score over 25 points so far this season. Rush ranks 29th in the league in passing yards, hasn’t topped 235 yards in any single game, and has just four touchdown throws to show for four-plus outings in 2022.
With questions still surrounding Prescott’s ability to properly grip the ball, Rush looks poised to get another start in Philadelphia.
But if Rush continues to play mistake-free football and the Cowboys come out of Lincoln Financial Field with another win, Aikman said on 96.7 The Ticket, “You start asking the question, “Do we put Dak back in?”
Many have likened the current situation to 2016, when Prescott took over as an untested rookie while Tony Romo recovered from a preseason back injury. Prescott was nothing short of spectacular, playing at a Pro Bowl level and guiding the team to eight straight wins at one point. Prescott kept the starting job even after Romo was declared healthy; Romo retired prior to the next season.
But Aikman recalled an even earlier changing of the guard, one that saw him continuing to hold the clipboard after rehabbing a knee injury.
“I went through this back in 1991, when Steve Beuerlein came in and won the last five games of the regular season, and then I was ready to play,” Aikman remembered. “Jimmy [Johnson, Cowboys head coach] stayed with Steve in the postseason, and I wasn’t happy about it.”
Ditto Prescott.
This week, after doing some light throwing to receivers for the first time since the Sept. 11 injury, Prescott told reporters he was “antsy as [expletive]” to return to the Cowboys lineup.
But Cowboys head coach Mike McCarthy and the team’s training staff is taking a methodical approach, wanting to ensure Prescott’s ability to stay on the active roster once he gets back on it.
“This is a 17-game season,” McCarthy said Wednesday. “I know Dak didn’t want to hear it, but we’ve got to make sure that he’s right for the long haul, too.”
Aikman couldn’t help but agree with that, even if he believes that the team might think long and hard about messing with a winning streak by making a change at the most important position on the field.
In Aikman’s case in 1991, he watched as Beuerlein got the start in the team’s divisional playoff game versus Detroit. The backup was ineffective that day, going 7-of-13 for 91 yards and an interception before being benched. Aikman was rusty in his return, and the Cowboys were bounced out of the postseason by a 38-6 final score.
“I don’t think there were questions within the organization as far as who was the future of the franchise,” Aikman recalled Thursday. “But those become hard questions.”
There’s riding the hot hand, and there’s sticking with it for just a little too long.
And that, Aikman agreed, is the real dilemma in Dallas these days.
“Dak is the quarterback of this franchise,” Aikman acknowledged. “I love the guy. And they’re better with Dak at quarterback, but the team is playing good football right now.”
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