Tag: 2021 season week 9

Broncos call Cowboys’ 4th-down plays ‘disrespectful;’ Dak Prescott upset by ‘lack of execution’

Several Denver players took the Cowboys’ early 4th-down conversion attempts personally; Dak Prescott feels they could have swung the game. | From @ToddBrock24f7

When the Cowboys lined up on 4th-and-1 on just the fourth play of Sunday’s game versus Denver, it may not have seemed like a controversial decision. The Cowboys came into the contest with one of the league’s top-ranked offenses by most any measure, running back Ezekiel Elliott was averaging 4.8 yards per rushing attempt on the season, and the ball was on the Broncos’ 38-yard-line. The alternative would have been a 56-yard-field goal try from a kicker who’s gone 1-of-3 from beyond 50 this season and just 4-of-12 from that distance as a Cowboy.

Going for it made perfect sense.

Unfortunately, Elliott was stuffed for a one-yard loss.

On Dallas’s next series, they went for it again on fourth down. This time, the ball was on the Denver 20. Rather than attempt a 38-yard field goal and put the first points of the afternoon on the scoreboard, the Cowboys went for it again, needing just two yards. Quarterback Dak Prescott’s throw to open wideout Cedrick Wilson fell incomplete.

Never mind what the analytics might say about going for it in those early and short-yardage situations on the plus-side of the field; Broncos wide receiver Tim Patrick chose to take it personally.

“Disrespectful,” Patrick said, as per the Broncos team website. “That [expletive]’s disrespectful. They trying us. And that’s what happens when you try us.”

The Cowboys went on to fail two more fourth-down conversion tries on the afternoon. 0-for-4 total. It’s not the reason they were blown out by a 30-16 score, but turning the ball over on downs on the first two possessions surely helped set a tone of ineffectiveness that carried over throughout the worst Dallas performance in quite some time.

Cowboys coach Mike McCarthy talked about inadvertently giving the Broncos a huge boost with those two plays.

“I mean, momentum,” McCarthy said in his postgame press conference. “We talk about momentum swings all the time. I think it’s important to respond to all the momentum swings. Especially if you have it, what do you do with it? And then frankly, when the opponent has it, how do you respond to it? The decisions? I’m fine with the decisions. The execution, particularly on the first one, they had better defense than we had play called; we had penetration in the A-gap and couldn’t get the ball to the edge on the outside zone. They came in aggressive.”

The second one was far more troubling. Aside from being in near-gimme territory for an NFL kicker to make a field goal and eschewing the seemingly easy three points, Prescott’s fluttering pass on the fourth-down to Wilson was ugly. So ugly, in fact, that the TV announcers and observers alike assumed it must have been deflected by a Denver defender.

“Yeah, I don’t think it was tipped,” Prescott confessed to reporters after the game. “I think I got ready to throw it on the crossing route, saw the guy’s hands up, and I think I just tried to change my arm angle at the last second and threw it, what, at his ankles? At that point, I was hoping Ced maybe made a catch, but yeah, I don’t miss those throws. Those are throws that I’ve worked on a long time, whether I’m moving my feet or whether I’m not able to get my back leg through, just finding a way to make that throw. That’s something I work hard on. It pisses me off when I miss a throw like that. That’s a big fourth down early in the game that we can keep going and move forward and get a touchdown. I think it just changed the whole way that this game plays and goes from there if I complete that and we’re able to stay on the field.”

But Prescott didn’t complete it, and the Cowboys weren’t able to stay on the field. And with a second straight fourth-down stop, the Broncos suddenly had some added juice.

“You take the field with a little anger, honestly,” Denver quarterback Teddy Bridgewater said. “It’s like, ‘Hey, man, they’re going for it because they’re saying our offense is not going to score or something.’ We talked about it in the huddle, and we used it as motivation… It’s one of those deals where you take the field and OK, you have a little added motivation to it. You can see that today.”

By the time the Cowboys tried to convert an another fourth down, the game was getting out of hand and it was desperation time. Down 19-0 midway through the third quarter, Dallas once again kept the offense on the field for a 4th-and 1 from their own 40. Despite needing just a few feet, Prescott went for broke. His deep ball missed wideout CeeDee Lamb. Badly.

“I definitely remember the play,” Prescott recalled. “Came back, CeeDee has a little return route. When I got back to him, he had turned and threw his hand up. There was a hole-player who was starting to make his way toward me. I mean, maybe I probably could have run, now looking back at it, but at the time, I was just trying to get it to CeeDee and make a big play and just put too much on it. It’s something that, as I’ve said, I’m missing throws and some throws on some crucial downs. Can’t have that.”

In the fourth quarter, Dallas was on the wrong side of their own 20 when they tried to move the sticks on a 4th-and-7. Prescott’s pass this time was intercepted. Five plays later, Denver extended their lead to 30-0.

Coming into the Week 9 game, the Cowboys had been 5-of-10 on fourth-down conversions. Now they’re 5-of-14.

The list of things that didn’t work for the Cowboys on Sunday is a long one. But questionable decisions and atrocious performances on key fourth-down plays has to be near the top of things the Dallas coaching staff must address heading into the back half of the regular season.

Prescott, for one, feels like his unit needs to keep punching. He suggested that the failed fourth downs didn’t diminish the offense’s confidence, even though he acknowledges that they boosted the opponents’.

“I mean, sure. I’m sure it does. But it doesn’t take confidence away from us,” the quarterback said. “It wasn’t about their confidence as much as it was just about our lack of execution in critical situations.”

“We just never got going,” McCarthy said in summary.

Broncos coach Vic Fangio knows all too well that fourth downs can cut both ways.

“Everybody wants to go for it on fourth down, right?” Fangio said. “Fourth-and-1, fourth-and-2… they cite all the numbers, so on and so forth. But when you don’t get them, it hurts. And we were the beneficiary of the hurt.”

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‘Definitely shocked:’ Dak Prescott looks for answers after Cowboys’ embarrassing no-show

“We got thumped in every aspect,” Dak Prescott said after the blowout; he and Mike McCarthy suggested the team may have “taken the cheese.” | From @ToddBrock24f7

It will go down in the permanent record as a 30-16 loss. But to those who watched it unfold, it was never that close; Dallas had to scramble to post all of their points within the final five minutes just to avoid being shut out at home.

The 6-1 Cowboys came in to Sunday’s Week 9 game with an opportunity to get off to their best start since 2016 and stake a legitimate claim as a front-runner in the race to the NFC’s lone postseason bye. All they had to do was take of business against a weaker opponent in a matchup that everyone had them favored to win, most by a wide margin. Instead, for three hours in Arlington, it was the 4-4 Broncos who played like a well-oiled machine and looked like the class of their conference as they rolled to a blowout win.

Even while standing at the podium and wearing street clothes, Dak Prescott seemed at a total loss to explain what had just happened. The Cowboys quarterback played an uncharacteristically poor game, but so did nearly every other player wearing the star on Sunday afternoon.

“Definitely shocked,” Prescott said in his postgame press conference. “They whooped us in every aspect. They beat us. That’s not something you ever think about or ever envision happening. But it’s something we’ll learn from. And we’ll learn from every aspect of it: offense, defense, special teams. Situationally, especially. We’ve just got to be better. We’ve got to play a cleaner game. We’ve got to start faster in a noon game like this. They did a better job at it: got on us and got on us fast. We were playing from behind and we weren’t able to do anything.”

Prescott in particular was ineffective for most of the game. While he ended up with a seemingly-respectable two touchdown passes and 232 passing yards, he went into halftime having completed just five of 14 throws for 75 yards and only one third down conversion.

“We got thumped in every aspect of the game, especially on offense,” he said. “I never got going. I missed some throws. We didn’t throw and catch the ball as we normally do. Wasn’t our best performance by any means, obviously our worst of the year.”

Sunday marked Prescott’s first game action in 20 days- after straining a calf in Week 6 against New England, then taking the bye week off, and finally missing the Halloween night thriller in Minnesota as he fully recovered. But Prescott said he felt no ill effects from the injury on Sunday, despite looking rusty and inaccurate for most of the afternoon.

“Obviously, I wasn’t as clean as I normally am or as I have been. It’s tough to say and blame that. I spent a lot of time off and came back in the first game [versus Tampa Bay] different. So I’m not going to sit there and blame two weeks when I had a great week of practice that I had under my belt coming into this one. I just missed some throws, and we just weren’t our normal selves in the passing game when we needed to be. We didn’t execute.”

But it certainly wasn’t just Prescott. The Cowboys defense gave up 190 rushing yards, allowed Denver to convert more than half of their third-down attempts, and let the Broncos dominate time of possession by more than a two-to-one margin.

“The physicality was definitely not what I’m looking for,” Cowboys head coach Mike McCarthy told reporters after the loss.

After ripping off six straight wins since the season opener, the Cowboys looked like a team who had perhaps started to believe their own hype. McCarthy even admitted that it had shown during the week leading up to Sunday’s debacle.

“Had concern on Wednesday, as far as the way we’ve come off some successful weeks,” McCarthy said. “The message was ‘Don’t take the cheese.’ And frankly, we were out-coached, we were out-played, all the way through. This is the first time I’ve felt clearly our energy didn’t exceed our opponent, and that’s disappointing.”

Prescott also hinted that maybe the Cowboys players were a little too full of themselves and looked past the Broncos.

“I don’t know,” Prescott began. “At this point- right after this game, when we started the way we did, we just weren’t able to get anything going, and got beat on all three phases- I would say maybe. When you win a game like we did last week, on the road in a tough environment with everything going against us, I think you sometimes think you can just roll out there and get it done, even when the adversity hits. I don’t think there was really ever a point until maybe the last few minutes in the game where we didn’t think that we were going to be able to get something going to win this game. Then when that sinks in, you just realize it’s the NFL. This is a tough business.”

Prescott was still out there in those last few minutes, despite being behind 30-0 late in the game. The Cowboys left all their starters in, risking exposure to injury in an attempt to make something positive happen before time expired.

“Frankly, the fourth quarter was a conscious effort to keep [Dak] in there for the two-minute work,” McCarthy explained. “That’s something that if I was looking at all the situational work that we’ve done and the commitment that you put to each situation, we needed that work. So I was happy to see us have some two-minute production, just because that’s something I think we definitely can carry forward out of this game.”

Prescott said he never considered that he wouldn’t finish the contest, regardless of the score or situation.

“I mean, there was game left out there to be played,” Prescott said. “I don’t think I ever– it never crossed my mind that I was coming out of the game. I think if somebody would have tried to make that decision, I would have told them I wasn’t. Yeah, we needed to get something going. We needed to get some energy, some momentum. We needed to show our fight, our resiliency, something that’s won us a lot of games. When you’re getting beat like that, you’ve got to show your character. I think that starts with all of us staying in the game and fighting ’til the end and trying to get some momentum or something going just to take from this game.”

What the Cowboys may have been able to take from the humiliating defeat remains to be seen. Prescott likened Sunday’s loss to a 23-0 drubbing at the hands of Indianapolis late in the 2018 season. Dallas had come in to that showdown on a five-game win streak; Indianapolis was just barely over .500 at the time.

The Cowboys came out the following week and beat Tampa Bay at AT&T Stadium to clinch the NFC East. This year’s crew will look to next week when they host Atlanta for their bounceback opportunity.

“I think everybody just has to be accountable for what just happened,” Prescott offered. “You win as a team, and you lose as a team. And it starts with the leaders; we’re not looking and asking the coaches to do something different. We’ve got to be more physical. We’ve got to take accountability in this loss and make sure that we come in tomorrow and make sure that we move forward from this, learn from it, and then in come in Wednesday and have a great day of practice and make sure that this is something we learn from. This feeling sucks and make sure we don’t feel this again.”

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Cowboys: Prescott to start, Tyron Smith officially out, Lamb questionable but ‘not of high concern’

No surprises on the final injury report of the week as Smith and Blake Jarwin are out. Lamb and Amari Cooper are considered questionable. | From @ToddBrock24f7

The Cowboys have been giving clues all week about which players will be available for Week 9’s home date against Denver. On Friday, it was printed out in black and white.

As expected, tackle Tyron Smith has been officially declared out as he deals with an ankle injury sustained in New England and then re-aggravated during last week’s win over Minnesota. Terence Steele will swing to replace Smith at left tackle, while La’el Collins will take over for Steele as the team’s right tackle.

Quarterback Dak Prescott carries no designation whatsoever on the final injury report of the week. Prescott “will do everything” in Friday’s walkthrough session, McCarthy said earlier in the day; the signal-caller was a full participant on Thursday as well. He is slated to start Sunday’s game after a one-week absence to nurse a strained calf.

Wide receiver CeeDee Lamb is considered questionable for Sunday’s interconference matchup; he tweaked an ankle during practice this week. Lamb was limited on Wednesday, did not practice at all on Thursday, and was limited again on Friday. Head coach Mike McCarthy, though, said Lamb’s ankle is “not of high concern;” he would “anticipate him at practice” on Saturday.

 

Fellow wideout Amari Cooper has also been given a questionable designation as he continues to work through a hamstring issue he suffered late in the game versus the Vikings. Cooper played through the injury, catching the game-winning touchdown pass after stretching out the muscle on the sideline. He was limited in practice all week.

Tight end Blake Jarwin has been confirmed to miss Sunday’s game after not practicing all week with a hip injury.

For Denver, starting left tackle Garett Bolles has been declared out with an ankle injury suffered in a Sunday win over Washington.

Outside linebacker Malik Reed is given a 50/50 chance to play with a hip issue; he has been filling in for Bradley Chubb, who is on injured reserve. The Broncos linebacker corps has seen significant turnover recently with the acquisitions of Stephen Weatherly from the Vikings and Kenny Young from the Rams, as well as Monday’s trading away of eight-time Pro Bowler Von Miller.

Offensive lineman Graham Glasgow, defensive lineman Mike Purcell, defensive back Caden Sterns, and tight end Albert Okwuegbunam are all listed as questionable, Okwuegbunam was scheduled to get extra snaps due to Noah Fant’s presence on the team’s Reserve/COVID list.

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Cowboys WR CeeDee Lamb sprains ankle; Dak Prescott should play Sunday

Mike McCarthy’s plan is for Prescott to play Week 9, but he has a dinged-up WR corps that saw his top 3 pass-catchers limited in practice. | From @ToddBrock24f7

The Cowboys started the season with a formidable three-headed monster at the wide receiver position. But those heads- Michael Gallup, Amari Cooper, and even CeeDee Lamb- are now dealing with their own separate injury concerns a few feet south, just as their quarterback appears to be over his own lower-body ailment.

Gallup has been shelved since just after the opener with an injured calf. Cooper reaggravated a hamstring this past Sunday. And on Wednesday, Lamb sprained an ankle in practice, according to head coach Mike McCarthy.

“He’ll be limited today,” McCarthy said of the second-year phenom out of Oklahoma. That was the only update provided to media members, so the extent of the injury is not known.

Lamb was seen working off to the side on Thursday, though, and is reportedly expected to suit up for Sunday’s date with Denver.

Cooper and Gallup also joined Lamb on the resistance cord circuit. McCarthy said of Cooper’s status, “I’d put him in the ‘limited’ [category]. Get him out there to go through the individual [portion], see how that goes.”

Gallup, however, who has missed the Cowboys’ entire six-game winning streak, may still be sidelined for a while. He has already been designated to return; the team has another week and a half to either declare him active or shut him down for the rest of 2021.

“Just want to see him get through a full week, then evaluate it,” McCarthy explained. “But I thought he had a really good week last week. We’ll just see how it goes; we’re kind of up in the air on where he is.”

To that trifecta of dinged-up pass-catchers, add tight end Blake Jarwin, who injured a hip against Minnesota last Sunday night. He is already considered doubtful for the Broncos matchup.

And of course, there’s the man who’s supposed to be throwing passes to all of the aforementioned. After nursing his strained calf back to health, Dak Prescott “will practice today [during] team periods,” McCarthy said. “The plan is for him to practice and play [on Sunday].”

The Broncos enter the weekend with one of the stingiest pass defenses in the league, allowing a total completion percentage of just 58.3%, second only to Buffalo. Their allowed passer rating is 82.7, fourth-lowest overall, and they’ve given up just nine touchdown receptions through eight games.

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Cowboys to break out red, white, and blue throwback helmet stripes for Salute to Service

An obscure bit of Cowboys trivia for years, the tri-colored helmet stripes will be worn as part of the NFL’s Salute to Service weekend. | From @ToddBrock24f7

To the casual time-traveling observer, it will look like 1976 all over again at AT&T Stadium this Sunday. That’s because the Cowboys’ helmets will feature a red, white, and blue center stripe for the first time since the nation’s 200th birthday 46 years ago.

The subtle tweak to one of the most iconic and longstanding uniforms in all of sports comes during the league’s annual Salute to Service weekend, honoring the men and women of the Unites States military.

For the Cowboys organization, there’s extra meaning. Charlotte Jones, daughter of owner Jerry Jones and a team Executive Vice President, is also the chairman of the National Medal of Honor Museum Foundation, with a new facility set to break ground in Arlington next year, within sight of the Cowboys’ home stadium.

Medal of Honor recipients will be in attendance for the Cowboys-Broncos Week 9 clash. Military members will be recognized at halftime. The Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders will also alter their uniforms for the one-day special occasion.

The tri-colored helmet stripe was a one-year alteration made in 1976, the 200th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. That year, the country had a collective case of Bicentennial fever. A red, white, and blue train was making a whistle-stop tour across the lower 48 states. Fireworks shows and parades were being planned in major cities. Historic tall ships from around the world docked in American harbors. Collectible coins were minted. Mailboxes and fire hydrants across the country got patriotic paint jobs from local citizens. The 1976 movie Rocky featured nods to the Bicentennial, dressing Apollo Creed’s character as George Washington and then Uncle Sam on fight night. Commercial products in stores were rewrapped in star-spangled packaging.

After sporting a special commemorative jersey patch in Super Bowl X, played in January of that year, the Cowboys’ legendary president and general manager Tex Schramm decided to do something different for the ’76 regular season, which would begin soon after the milestone July 4 celebration.

The Cowboys’ helmet stripe and the Bicentennial festivities were a one-year anomaly. After that 11-3 season and an NFC East title, Roger Staubach and Dallas lost to the Rams in the playoffs. The red, white, and blue helmet stripes were never seen again, except in old photographs of that singular season and now on tours through The Star in Frisco, where a mannequin wearing a reproduction helmet is used as a trivia question by tour guides trying to stump visitors.

And except for this Sunday, when the Spirit of ’76 will live again for one afternoon as America’s Team honors America’s real-life heroes.

“The red stripe on the helmet provides a beautiful ribbon to wrap around this salute to those who currently serve our country’s military,” Charlotte Jones said as part of the official uniform anouncement, “and the patriotic love and appreciation that we all share for those who came before them.”

For a more in-depth look back at the Cowboys’ Bicentennial helmets, check out the retrospective piece from Cowboys Wire at this link. It was originally published on July 4, 2020 and excerpted briefly for this article.

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Cowboys LT Tyron Smith expected to miss Week 9 vs Broncos with ankle injury

The 7-time Pro Bowler lasted 31 snaps before a bone spur in his ankle forced him out; Mike McCarthy says he’d be “pressed to play.” | From @ToddBrock24f7

Once again, the Cowboys are preparing to play a game this weekend as if one of their most important offensive starters won’t be ready to go.

Left tackle Tyron Smith had already been dealing with an ankle issue, and it flared up again during the second quarter of the team’s 20-16 win Sunday in Minnesota, forcing the seven-time Pro Bowler to miss the remainder of the game.

In a midweek press conference, Cowboys head coach Mike McCarthy confirmed that Smith would not practice on Wednesday and expressed doubt about his availability for the team’s home date with the Broncos this weekend.

“He’d be pressed to play,” McCarthy stated plainly.

Smith originally suffered the ankle injury in Week 6 versus New England and was limited leading up to the Halloween night tilt against the Vikings. He lasted 31 snaps before leaving the game. Team owner Jerry Jones called it a bone spur issue in a radio interview Tuesday.

If Smith sits, the offensive line will undergo something of a shuffle, a routine that fans became accustomed to seeing last season. Right tackle La’el Collins has returned from his five-game suspension, but did not take over his starting position in Week 8, as Terence Steele stayed put. Moving forward, Steele could remain on the right side with Collins sliding down to Smith’s left spot, or Steele could swing to replace Smith at left while Collins comes back to his usual position.

On Sunday, it was Ty Nsekhe who replaced Smith.

McCarthy declined to offer any hints about which way the team would go for the Week 9 interconference matchup.

“We’ve got some options we’re looking at. Frankly, I don’t want to tell you. We’d rather Denver find out when they find out.”

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