The team’s new receiving group didn’t look all that impressive. There were some well-timed passing plays with Noah Brown and Dennis Houston, but those plays were few and far between. The chemistry between Prescott and the team’s new top-dog receiver, CeeDee Lamb, was not very good as they struggled to connect all night.
While those aspects were not perfect, it’s hard to overlook the bad performance of Dak Prescott. The seventh-year quarterback finished 14 of 29 throwing for just 174 yards with no touchdowns and one interception.
His QB rating of 47.2 was the lowest mark since the 2017 season when the Cowboys got smoked 37-9 in a crucial divisional loss to the
Philadelphia Eagles. And it was his lowest completion percentage since his rookie season when the Cowboys lost 10-7 to the
New York Giants. Suffice it to say, it wasn’t a very good game for Dak.
But what went wrong?
One of the first things that jumped out about Dak on Sunday night is how often he was throwing into coverage. There were multiple instances where it appeared as if he didn’t recognize that a defender was sitting in zone coverage and that he was close enough to make a play on the ball. Prescott tried to zip the ball into a tight throwing window, but Bucs defenders were able to close just enough to get a hand on the ball. Dak’s most egregious error on the night came when he made an off-balance thrown on the run right into the arms of the Bucs' safety.
You got a sense of Prescott’s lack of trust in his throwing lanes as there was
hesitancy with his delivery. Sometimes he would change his mind at the last second, and often times that meant a hurried throw that went incomplete. Dak would double-pump at times as he waited for the receiver to be in a better spot to create a better throwing lane, but those motions threw off his timing and resulted in passes that went behind his target. These were throws Prescott normally makes so it was strange to see him be off on these plays.
Accuracy was a problem all night for Dak as he struggled to throw a good ball. There were blatant high throws that the receiver had absolutely no chance to catch and there were plays that were just slightly off target that resulted in yet another incomplete pass. Whether this is attributed to the lack of reps he has had with some of the new inexperienced receivers or just poor mechanics on Dak’s part, it was not the type of play we’re used to seeing from Prescott.
This is a
dark place for Cowboys fans to be in as the team has shown a history of collapsing when their starter goes down. In fact, the last three times their opening-day starting QB missed an extended amount of time, the Cowboys finished 6-10 (2020), 4-12 (2015), and 6-10 (2010). That is not good.
For more see:
https://www.bloggingtheboys.com/202...a-big-reason-offense-sputtered-tampa-bay-bucs
