DALLAS — This wasn’t the start that Dallas Cowboys fans were hoping for, but perhaps the one that they should have expected.
With Dallas playing listless football, and losing to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers 19-3, the season opener was ugly from start to finish on the field and it only got worse with the news that came after the game concluded.
The injury to quarterback Dak Prescott is a killer. The Cowboys expected their star signal caller to be the superhero willing the team to victory to make up for deficiencies all throughout the roster, but that plan is on hold for now.
Prescott has a right thumb fracture that will keep him out 6-8 weeks. It’s exactly the kind of news that the Cowboys couldn’t afford to hear after a tough Week 1.
The bad news to go along with the worst news is the offense didn’t even look good with Prescott in the lineup. The Cowboys managed three points on their opening series, but then had three straight meaningless drives.
Two three-and-outs, and a Prescott interception deflated any momentum that the offense had early on. After leading 3-0, the Cowboys wouldn’t put another point on the board for the rest of the game as they failed to score a touchdown in a season opener for the first time since 2001.
The offense managed just 244 total yards and they frankly looked overmatched. Prescott threw into triple coverage too often trying to find his new No. 1 wide receiver CeeDee Lamb, who dropped a sure first down on one attempt. For much of the evening, Lamb failed to gain separation on many of his routes.
Without another threat at receiver for the Cowboys, the Buccaneers surrounded Lamb and made Prescott force the ball into tight windows, which he wasn’t able to achieve.
Dallas was successful running the ball early on with RB Ezekiel Elliott, but the penalty issues continuously put the offense behind the down and distance, nullifying the rush attack. After a season where they led the NFL in penalties, the Cowboys picked right up where they left off, committing 10 penalties for 73 yards. Mike McCarthy mentioned how the team prepared all offseason to have better discipline, but it took just one game to see that wasn’t the case.
Right tackle Terence Steele, who the Cowboys believed in enough to release a high-quality player in La’el Collins, was called for four penalties, including three false starts. On one drive, Steele was flagged three times. An offense that was having trouble moving the ball consistently cannot shoot themselves in the foot with penalties. Yet here the Cowboys were, getting behind the chains with pre-snap infractions.
The mistakes compounded as the Dallas offense had drops, penalties, and couldn’t move the ball behind a haphazardly rebuilt offensive line and a receiver corps that lost talented players that the franchise never bothered to replace. It was a frustrating night on offense, but it shouldn’t have been surprising.
Throughout the spring, the Cowboys got worse on the offensive line, worse at wide receiver, and didn’t play their starters in the preseason, even when it was clear that the whole group needed to build a rapport with Prescott to have success.
Despite Week 1 being a worst-case scenario, it’s hardly shocking to see the results. Jerry and Stephen Jones tried to rebrand the offense with less talent in favor of untested youth while selling the expectations of a similar outcome from last year, when they led the league in points scored.
It was always a foolish plan, and the Week 1 loss is indicative of a lazy strategy employed at the top of the organization. Even with a healthy Prescott, the on-the-fly retooling and misdirection at critical spots on the roster gave Dallas very little chance.
Ah, but the organization was betting on the defense being better in year two of defensive coordinator Dan Quinn and all-world Micah Parsons. Both of those things were true for about a half of football, as Parsons looked like the best player on the field, picking up two sacks and keeping the Cowboys in the game.
However, with the offense floundering, the Dallas defense was on the field for too long and eventually couldn’t stop the Buccaneers and running back Leonard Fournetter from gashing them in the run game. That run defense was an issue last season as well and became a big reason for the Cowboys’ early playoff exit.
In Week 1 of the 2022 season, it was the undoing of the defense again. The Cowboys gave up 127 yards to Fournette, who ran for six yards per carry, and 151 yards on the ground.
The beginning of a fresh season usually provides hope and excitement but all it delivered for Dallas was a rough night and a fitful immediate future. Every reason that the team could fail, every possible glass-half-empty preseason assessment came to fruition, and every offseason mismanagement chicken came home to roost.
The offensive line struggled, the WRs had trouble getting open, and the defense couldn’t stop the run, all while the penalties piled up. And now the Cowboys are without their franchise leader for the bulk of the season’s first half.
Prescott’s injury already puts the season on the brink of collapse since they don’t have a good enough backup and were poised to rely too much on Prescott to begin with. It feels way too early to be at a crossroad in 2022, but here the Dallas Cowboys are. At 0-1, the sky is falling and much of it is of their own doing.
If only they could’ve seen this coming.
Do you think the Cowboys will be able to recover for their Week 1 loss? Share your predictions with Ben on Twitter @BenGrimaldi.
