Back in late summer, Cowboys fans were dreaming wistfully of watching their star quarterback, with a gruesome injury squarely in his rearview mirror and the Comeback Player of the Year award tucked safely in his back pocket, lead their team onto the field during Super Bowl LVI pregame festivities to close out a fairytale season.
Turns out Bengals fans were reading from the same storybook. But they’re the only ones in line for a happily-ever-after. Joe Burrow is on the cusp of a downright magical coronation; Dak Prescott is just another guy watching it from the sofa.
That Prescott wasn’t named the Associated Press NFL Comeback Player of the Year doesn’t really matter that much, not in the grand scheme of things. Given a choice, Prescott, the Cowboys organization, and their millions of fans would obviously have rather never been in the running for the honor to begin with.
But as the 28-year-old Prescott endured endless months of rehab, persevered through an entire offseason and training camp under the microscope, and finally re-took the playing field only to silence his critics by not merely returning to his previous form but surpassing it, it seemed hard to imagine that anyone else could possibly win the comeback accolade for 2021.
So, just as Cowboys fans were left asking about their season as a whole… what happened???