I really thought that Jason Garrett was going to be a great coach, eventually. I thought that once he got his type of players in there, got rid of the dead weight, and got his system in place, he would be great. Or maybe I was just really wanted it to be true. And I've been a strong defender of his on this board. My faith has waned throughout the year, starting with the whole deal with him giving up play calling. Not that I didn't think it was a good move, allowing him to just be a HC. I just didn't have a good feel about how it was going down. Seemed like there was kind of a wrestling match between him and JJ. Now, I hate to say, my faith is gone. What I saw yesterday, I've seen (we've all seen) too many times. This kind of crappy management needed to be eradicated by this point.
We have a defense that has been decimated by injury. That can't go unsaid. Plus, we have a DC that seems to be way past his time. Thus, we're going to be a disadvantage in pretty much any game we play. This is where Garrett would really shine if he had the ability. The Bears don't have any better defense than we do, yet they find a way to be able to hide that defense, at least enough to win the game. Yesterday, against Cleveland, they got a lead, and even though they were giving up points to an average offense (granted with one outstanding player), they continued to run the ball. 31 times. They shortened the game as much as they could. They saw the Browns creeping toward the LOS, but kept running anyway. The passed to get the lead, and they ran it to win.
I'm not saying we should have completely abandoned the pass and gone strictly with the run, like some have implied. If you go 3 and out running the ball, yeah, you've taken about 3 minutes off the clock, but you're still giving the ball back to other team, and trusting a defense that gets scored on more easily, and more often, than your average female porn star. But you have to do what you can to shorten the game, not lengthen it. Sure, you still pass some, but you have to lean on your running game, especially one that had been working.
What I saw in that game yesterday was something I've seen way too many times with this team - lack of composure. When we gave up that easy score early in the second half, you could feel everyone tighten up, including Garrett. I'm sure he felt he had to keep the ball away from GB and score more points at the same time. I just can't agree with how he went about doing it. You have a 16 point lead (after the GB score), and not only do you stay predominantly with the pass, you go almost exclusively to it. You just don't see good teams, with good coaches, do that. Even strong passing teams like NO, GB, and NE start utilizing the run more. Sure, they keep throwing, but they become much more balanced, and even go more run than pass. We go almost more out of balance to the passing side. They seem to stay in control. We get out of control.
Did Romo go against Garrett on that next to last possession? Sounds like it. But as the HC, you have to control that. Tony is great, but historically, he's demonstrated a pattern of giving the ball away in situations where there is less than five minutes left, and we're either tied or up by one score or less. To give him the reins to make that call on his own, and put him back into that situation on his own, without being checked, shows that as a HC, Garrett doesn't have control. And if he doesn't have that control, he has no business being our HC.
If he goes, he goes. I don't like hoping for a man to lose his job. I've lost a job, under really tough circumstances, so I don't wish that on anyone. Yeah I know, he's a millionaire, and he'll land on his feet somewhere. Maybe he'll move into the front office (where I think he'd be really good). But still, losing your job sucks. That said, it needs to happen. The problem is, I have no faith in Jerry to do what's in the team's best interest in terms of getting a new HC, as opposed to his own. If he continues his pattern of going with HC's that allow him to continue to call the majority of the shots, firing Garrett will just be another in the long line of inconsequential decisions that man has made.
