Dallas Cowboys head coach Mike McCarthy downplayed the notion that his team took the Denver Broncos too lightly heading into Week 9’s embarrassing home defeat.
McCarthy’s boss did not stop short of levying such claims.
Holding his weekly radio interview Tuesday, November 9, owner and general manager Jerry Jones flamed the “flat” and “lackadaisical” Cowboys for its “overconfidence” against the Broncos — the prime suspect in a 30-16 massacre that nobody, least of all Jones, saw coming.
“The thought of getting beat was not in my mind. … I do believe we let the momentum get away from us, and it reflected in our body language. … When you don’t concentrate on just the physicalness. … You can have what happened to you the other day,” Jones said on 105.3 The Fan. ‘We thought we were ready. … We weren’t, and that’s as flat as any team I’ve seen. We’ve got to get back. … We let our home crowd not get into the game the way you expect a home crowd to do. We basically played what seemed lackadaisical.”
Lackadaisical isn’t the word to do this loss justice. The Cowboys, riding the high of a six-game winning streak, completely, and from top to bottom, no-showed at AT&T Stadium. The offense was blanked until the fourth quarter, with the Broncos building a 30-0 lead. The defense repeatedly failed to stop the bleeding, gashed for 407 total yards. The special teams blocked and recovered a punt, and fell victim to the weirdest rule in NFL history.
It just wasn’t Dallas’ day. At all. In any respect.
But alas …
“I don’t think any of us thought we’d come out of there without a victory Sunday,” Jones said, via the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
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Jones Questions Dak Playing Deep Into Blowout
McCarthy raised more than a few eyebrows with his decision to play franchise quarterback Dak Prescott, he of a freshly-healed calf strain, for each and every minute of a non-competitive affair.
Prescott finished 19 of 39 for 232 passing yards, two touchdowns, and one interception, though both of his scores came in garbage time with the Broncos gently easing off the gas pedal. He also converted a two-point conversion via the ground, risking an injury re-aggravation — and prompting Jones’ assessment, which seemingly questions McCarthy’s handling of the $160 million signal-caller.
“We were very careful for the long range of not playing Dak last week,” Jones said on 105.3 The Fan, via Bleacher Report. “We were very careful. It was a long-range thought. When he is in the game don’t think he is not going to make every play like it’s a Super Bowl play so if you have got concern about the fact of what would it do for your season if he had another injury that is the time to be concerned about it.”
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Quinn: Cowboys ‘Got Some S*** to Fix’
While Jones, as of Tuesday, was still ruminating over Dallas’ Week 9 loss, defensive coordinator Dan Quinn publicly turned the page to Week 10, and the club’s matchup against the visiting Atlanta Falcons.
This will represent the first time Quinn has faced the Falcons since his firing as its head coach. But the 51-year-old is neither focused on nostalgia nor retribution. Nor is he interested in discussing either hypothetical storyline.
“I have great memories for there and I always will and I think a lot of the really cool things that we accomplished there – and there were a lot of them – versus how it ended. And I think that’s an important declaration,” Quinn said Monday, via the official team website. “I’ll certainly be forever grateful to (Falcons owner) Arthur (Blank) to give me the opportunity there and to all of the players I had the privilege to coach.
“But you guys saw the performance yesterday, so there is no time to take a stroll down memory lane. We’ve got some s*** to fix. So I’ll be right where my feet are, right where I’m supposed to be, going after it as hard as we can.”
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Jerry Jones Rips ‘Flat’ Cowboys, Questions Mike McCarthy