With the loss by Dallas and the win by Philly, pretty much set that Dallas will not win the division. Possible, but now a game behind Philly, have to make that game up, Philly not playing well, but as we saw yesterday, they find ways to win. But we'll see.
But assuming we'll be on the road for all playoff games, as history this season and the last few shows, soon as we play a good team on the road, it's a loss. Which brings us to the future. Can Dallas take the next step and move from pretender to contender?
We do have very good to great young players- Cee Dee, Parsons, Tyler Smith, Ferguson, Pollard, Bland, Diggs, Aubrey. Add to that other young guys who the jury's still out on, and who may yet develop into very good to great players - Tolbert, Hendershot, Williams, and I'd even include Mazi, much as I think he's not shown as much as you expect from a first round pick.
Some of the older guys like Lawrence, Armstrong, and Osa should still be good for another year or two or three.
Add those together and we have a good core of players to work with.
The question I have is not the players, but the coaches. I don't have much faith in McCarthy to get better, he had Aaron Rodgers for years and won 1 Super Bowl. Lots of questionable coaching during that tenure. Has had time with Dallas as well, but the same problems remain. (Running Dak up the middle on 2nd and 13?????)
Quinn to my view is as good as he needs to be. Regardless of who you play, to blow out teams like 40-0 shows you can coach an NFL defense. Of course, can't do anything about the refs, you can be sure Dallas will get shafted there regardless of who are the coaches. So might as well ignore that factor.
Much afraid we're seeing Dallas win as much as they are going to with MM at the helm. Barring some incredible luck and all other playoff teams getting hit by a rash of injuries to key players, better enjoy the regular season wins and the occasional first round playoff win, because that's as good as it's going to get as long as Jerry is the owner/general manager....