The Dallas Cowboys dominating win over the Green Bay Packers on Sunday at Lambeau Field makes for an interesting bye week coming up.
Dallas is now 5-1 without their starting quarterback Tony Romo and their number one receiver Dez Bryant. The Cowboys have accelerated their five in a row wins behind the rookies. Dak Prescott and Zeke Elliott are running and passing their way through teams.
Now the argument can be made that the Packers are no longer the same powerhouse team. The decline started last season when Minnesota won the division. The Packers are on the downward spiral. However, they still have Aaron Rodgers and coach Mike McCarthy who are dangerous and can catch fire at any time.
After the win in Green Bay, Dallas now settles into their bye week and looking towards the Philadelphia Eagles on Sunday Night Football in two weeks. While on their bye week, Dallas has some big questions to answer.
The whole Dak vs. Tony debate is overdone, and no matter what fans want, Jerry Jones will ultimately get his way. With the win in Green Bay, this is going to be a difficult thing for Jerry to do. If Jones doesn’t think winning in Lambeau Field doesn’t mean anything then he isn’t the intelligent owner people give him credit for.
It would be hard for an owner and coach to pull Prescott out of the lineup now. Yes, he is a rookie, but he doesn’t play like a rookie. He’s calm, collected and smart. He doesn’t try to force passes to receivers. Dak goes to the open receiver. This is a very intelligent way to play football. Romo has a tendency to try to force things that aren’t there because he wants to please his receivers or he wants to be the hero. Romo has been there for the team and the team not so much for Romo, but you cannot break this chemistry up that Dak has with his offense. Winning has to be the ultimate goal, not feelings.
So no matter what they may be saying to the media, the goal is to win the most games out of 16 and get to the playoffs. Now Dallas has to decide which quarterback gives them that best chance. No feelings involved in the decision they just have to go with what’s working. They cannot bench Dak for Romo the way he is playing.
Supposedly Romo was supposed to return for the Eagles game, but now Dallas is tweeting out that they want to wait until Romo is 1000% healthy. This is a way for them to cover their butts with the Romo-friendly fans. Romo will never be that healthy in his career again. He has missed the equivalent of 2 almost three full NFL seasons due to injuries. These are the things Dallas has to weight when making their final decision.
Romo is getting paid regardless of whether he is the backup quarterback or starting quarterback. His salary remains the same. Romo is much better off coaching the young rookie from the sidelines and being there if he is needed. Right now, he is not needed. Dak has this.
The other bye week decision to make is exactly how much they want to involve Dez Bryant back into the offense when he returns to Philly. The offense has been running like a well-oiled machine without him and his ego. Dez can be a good player, but he hasn’t lived up to his contract he whined for last year. Dez just needs to sit back, become a team player and stop running his mouth to the media and Twitter. For this offense to continue to succeed when Dez returns he needs to become a team player so that Dallas has an even bigger threat along with the running game.
It will be interesting to see what Dallas does during the week of rest. Decisions that they are going to have to make can determine if they continue to surprise and succeed or if they go back to being the same old Dallas Cowboys.