Well, that certainly wasn’t the way they planned it. Almost every aspect of the Dallas Cowboys’ 26-6 loss to the Washington Commanders was as ugly as it gets.
The regular season finale was supposed to be a game where the team fought for the right to possibly earn the top seed in the conference. If anything was shown in the embarrassing loss, it was that these Cowboys weren’t ready to be the division’s best team, let alone the NFC’s top dog.
Ron Rivera’s Commanders were a team starting a first-snaps rookie quarterback and losers of three straight Yet they dominated Mike McCarthy’s Cowboys. It was a mistake-prone game by the Cowboys from the coin toss to the final whistle, and the worst performance by Dallas in the McCarthy era.
This wasn’t a game that can’t be explained as the Cowboys looked nothing like the 12-win team from this season, instead playing like a team that was ready for the next seven months off. Here’s the good, the bad, and the ugly from a disappointing Week 18 performance.