FRISCO, Texas — The Dallas Cowboys‘ season has been miserable.
At 2-7 and losers of 4 in a row, the Cowboys look headed for a prime-5 choose within the 2021 NFL draft moderately than a playoff spot.
The excellent news is the Cowboys are on their bye in Week 10, however once they come again to work, they could possibly be in final place within the NFC East ought to the New York Giants beat the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday.
As a lot as coach Mike McCarthy, gamers, proprietor and basic supervisor Jerry Jones and government Stephen Jones say the Cowboys are within the playoff chase, that is solely as a result of no different groups within the division are any good. The division is 9-24-1 getting into Week 10 video games.
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While the Cowboys play just one staff the remainder of this season that presently has a successful document, they’re on tempo to end 4-12. It would match the second-worst mark of the Jones period. In 2015, the Cowboys went 4-12. In 1989, Jones’ first 12 months proudly owning the staff, Dallas went 1-15. From 2000 to 2002, they went 5-11 3 times.
Seven video games stay. It would possibly really feel like seven months.
“How you handle that is simple,” six-time Pro Bowl guard Nate Newton mentioned. “You know the offense. You know the defense. You learn the ins and outs, and then you go play for yourself. I don’t give a s— what nobody tries to tell you about ‘team this,’ and ‘team that.’ No, no, no. Everybody that’s not under contract has to know that their ass is on the line. For the guys who haven’t been in a playoff game, act like you’re in a playoff game. For guys that have played in the playoffs, continue like it’s the playoffs. You can’t afford to show those coaches or the other 31 teams that you’re unworthy because right now ‘loser,’ is stamped on your head.”
Newton was on the 1-15 Cowboys staff in ’89. They misplaced their first eight video games and their final seven. He discovered this lesson, although, in the course of the 3-13 end in 1988, coach Tom Landry’s final season, thanks to former Cowboys teammate and huge receiver Kelvin Martin.
“I said, ‘Homey, we’re getting our ass kicked,’ and he said, ‘But you know what? Out of all these ass-kickings, Nate, I’m going to make sure I’m playing as hard as I can within this scheme to make sure I have a job when this is over, either here or somewhere else,'” Newton mentioned. “He opened my eyes.”
It’s exhausting to know whether or not these realizations are being felt inside McCarthy’s locker room right here in 2020. The protection has put up strong efforts in back-to-back weeks. The offense, with its fourth totally different beginning quarterback, Garrett Gilbert, confirmed battle within the 24-19 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers.
If progress will be measured in effort, then perhaps McCarthy’s message is getting via even when the wins aren’t occurring, but.
Former security Darren Woodson was Newton’s teammate for the Cowboys’ Super Bowl groups within the Nineteen Nineties, however he additionally withstood the three straight 5-11 finishes with coach Dave Campo because the staff’s star light. In 2000, the Cowboys misplaced 5 of their final six video games. In 2001, that they had two totally different 4-sport shedding streaks. In 2002, Dallas gained two of its final 10 video games.
During one season, Woodson remembers listening to a defensive participant murmur within the again of the assembly room as then-defensive coordinator Mike Zimmer was ripping the participant’s effort and approach.
“I stopped the meeting and stood up and just said, ‘This is why we can’t f—ing win a game because you don’t want to be coached,'” Woodson mentioned. “Zim was like, ‘Darren, chill out.’ No, we’re 5-11. We are who we are. Just a bull—- ass team.”
Woodson had the cache of Super Bowl rings, Pro Bowl honors and was on his approach to changing into the franchise’s all-time chief in tackles.
“As the season goes on, it’s brutal, man,” Woodson mentioned. “Think about it. It just becomes those dog days where there’s no light at the end of the tunnel. You’re not in the playoffs and you’re just playing games. It’s basically just games. And then it becomes the selfish side because the one thing you can’t do is put bad tape out there. … You have to put your best product out there because you never know if it will be a new coach coming in or they’re letting you go. Other people are watching the tape. It becomes, I’m sorry to say, more of a save-yourself moment.”
If the staff does not win, then success is measured in several methods. In 1989, the Cowboys had to battle inside and exterior pressures from the firing of Landry to the inexperience of coach Jimmy Johnson and his largely faculty-based mostly workers.
Washington Football Team defensive coordinator Jack Del Rio was a beginning linebacker on that Cowboys staff with one win that season. After giving up no less than 27 factors in every of the primary seven video games, the Dallas protection allowed greater than 20 factors in a sport 3 times within the remaining 9 contests.
“It was tough to hear the banter, but really we had a run defensively in the second half of that season, I think we were at or near the top with what we did the last half of the year,” Del Rio mentioned. “We were building something with an eye toward the future.
“The core of that staff gained three of 4 Super Bowls a couple years later. … To me, even when it’s a dangerous document, it’s skilled soccer; folks put together exhausting, they play exhausting; there’s expertise. The one victory we had that 12 months was towards the Redskins. The backside line is we beat a good staff, and we constructed a good staff whereas there. Sometimes there are gradual years, however the professionalism and work ethic and toughness and grit and willingness to go, none of that was lacking. We weren’t superb but, however we turned good.”
1:13
Ryan Clark does not believe Jerry Jones when he says it’s ridiculous for the Cowboys to consider drafting a QB like Trevor Lawrence when they have Dak Prescott.
Barry Church has a different perspective as a former Cowboys player, but he was like a lot of fans when the Cowboys’ 2020 season started. He thought Dallas would be contenders in the division and beyond. As a starting safety, he thought the same thing in 2015 when the Cowboys were coming off a controversial divisional-round loss in 2014 to the Green Bay Packers.
Then, quarterback Tony Romo went down with a broken collarbone and the Cowboys lost seven straight games. After a 2-0 start, Dallas started four quarterbacks that season, just like this year and just like 2001, and finished 4-12.
“It’s nearly the very same factor as 2015,” Church said. “They had all these expectations coming into the 12 months. It’s, ‘We’re so hyped. We introduced on this expertise from the draft. Got some good free brokers. This is the 12 months.’ Then they misplaced their major man and even earlier than that they weren’t enjoying as effectively, however they nonetheless had hope as a result of Dak Prescott was on the market. They nonetheless had confidence they might flip this factor round. But then he is gone and that had to be [deflating].”
In Greg Ellis’ first two seasons as a defensive end with the Cowboys, they made the playoffs. The 1998 and ’99 teams weren’t great, but they were competitive as quarterback Troy Aikman, wide receiver Michael Irvin, running back Emmitt Smith and others, like Woodson, fought for one more run at glory.
But then came a stretch when only 15 wins happened in a 45-game span, which brought on the arrival of coach Bill Parcells in 2003.
“Oh, man, it just felt like the days were 30-hour days,” Ellis mentioned. “You have to be careful to not fall into the sky-is-falling trap and the illusion that everything is bad. There has to be some bright spots. They’re hard to find, but there has to be some.”
Ellis remembers full-padded practices and stroll-throughs with inside run drills. The coaches had been mad, which he understood, however he wasn’t certain that helped the staff get any higher.
“One thing Campo said was, ‘You can’t negate leaving a steak in the oven too long,” Ellis mentioned. “You got a good steak, you follow all of the instructions on how to cook it, but if you overcook it, that steak’s now not that good.
“My coronary heart goes out to the blokes as a result of I do know it. You simply really feel it, like, ‘Wow, can we push the rewind button and begin over, or can we simply hit the quick-ahead button and get it over with.'”
NFL Nation reporter John Keim contributed to this story.
