This is Feeling a Lot Like 2010

[Gameover]

The 2010 team was being picked by many to go to the SB that year. The Cowboys were coming off an 11-5 season in which they won the division and their first playoff game in 13 years. The team bought in to all the press clippings and SB predictions and became complacent entering the 2010 season. The Cowboys clearly weren't focused and ready to play heading into Washington on opening day. The expectations were high for the team and the Cowboys were never able to overcome the disappointing loss to Washington.

The Cowboys appeared to have won that game with a TD in the final seconds but the play was nullified by a holding call and the Cowboys never recovered from that loss. Once Romo was lost in week 7 the season was over and the team packed it in 2 weeks later vs GB in a humiliating loss that led to Wade's firing the next day. Unlike the 2010 Cowboys that were expected to be good the 2014 Cowboys were expected to be bad and this season is going just as many predicted.

I picked that team to finish 7-9.

This team looks like 2011 team that should've won 11 games(what I picked them to win) ,can this team get the same 2011 performance from Romo? If they can, this team will the 11 games that I predicted for this season!

 

[TheMarathonContinues]

Garrett doesn't have this magical power to make players play hard for him. Parcells players played hard for him because they respected him. Wade, although was criticized for that one bad season should be credited for turning our defense around in 2009.

I don't buy in that Garrett's players play hard for him. If thats the case why does he have so many injured players that don't care about playing under his watch? Why are we as undisciplined as ever as a team, consistently making the same mistakes over and over?

Give it up. Garrett's players don't work hard for him more so they would work hard for any other coach. Thats a myth thats not proven and can't be proven just like they branded him as a "red-headed genius".

I don't know what Garrett has or doesn't have. Only those players know that. I'm on the outside looking in and from the outside looking in it looks like these guys like playing for Garrett. I don't look at guys on this team and say "Well t hey aren't playing hard". Most coaches lose their players by this time especially with a string of failure seasons.

You're spending too much time figuring out what's wrong with Garrett and ignoring some things he does well.

 

[Idgit]

I don't know what Garrett has or doesn't have. Only those players know that. I'm on the outside looking in and from the outside looking in it looks like these guys like playing for Garrett. I don't look at guys on this team and say "Well t hey aren't playing hard". Most coaches lose their players by this time especially with a string of failure seasons.

You're spending too much time figuring out what's wrong with Garrett and ignoring some things he does well.

Also, this isn't really a Garrett bashing thread in disguise, though it's in danger of becoming one. Especially given that 2010 was really Wade's last year at putting the team together.

A lot of things besides the head coach go into the makeup of a football team.

 

[Zordon]

It's been reported many times, from many sources, that Garrett's demeanor in front of the Dallas press and his demeanor in front of his players is very different.

This goes back to the discussion we always get after losses where fans think a coach is weak or a QB is not taking responsibility simply because of what they say in a public press conference. I'm always blown away by that because it seems so evident that that's a tiny fraction of the discussion these guys have on the topic of the loss, and it's a setting that's so obviously contrived to be sanitary and not emotional.

We've got the same discussion going on about Demarco Murray in another thread where fans think for some reason he's not likely to be vocal about his dissatisfaction with the play change on the goal line sack. I think it's pretty obvious that he had something to say about that to his teammates. The fact that it does not get aired publicly is a. not a surprise and b. not a bad thing by any interpretation.

I've heard those opinions, I'm not sure I agree. I've seen his behind the scene speeches and post-game speeches in the locker room, he comes off very manufactured and uninspiring imo. There are times after big wins, I could tell the team just wanted him to let loose....instead we got the "Cowboys on three, make it loud" BS. Go look at Andy Reid's postgame after the Eagles win last year. That's a team that would ride and die for their coach even thru the tough times.

 

[KJJ]

I picked that team to finish 7-9.

This team looks like 2011 team that should've won 11 games(what I picked them to win) ,can this team get the same 2011 performance from Romo? If they can, this team will the 11 games that I predicted for this season!

Puzzling how you could predict a 7-9 record for the 2010 team and an 11-5 record for this team. This team doesn't have near the defensive talent of the 2011 team. I predicted the Cowboys would fall flat in 2010 but didn't anticipate a 6-10 season or even a losing season. I kept thinking back to the 08 season when most everyone thought that would be the Cowboys year after the big disappointment in 2007. The Cowboys got caught up reading all their press clippings buying into the many SB predictions entering the 08 season. I saw the same thing happening entering the 2010 season. The Cowboys could have gone 12-4 in 2011. They blew a lead to NY on opening day with Romo throwing that game away with a pick in the final minute. They blew a franchise record 24 point lead to Detroit with the help of a meltdown performance by Romo. The following week vs NE they blew a lead in the final minutes due to Garrett having his offense sit on the ball instead of trying to put the game away with a couple of first downs. He allowed his defense that just got toasted by Matt Stafford in the 4th quarter the previous week to try and stop Tom Brady in the final couple of minutes. Against AZ the Cowboys blew another lead and Garrett put the final touches on the game by icing his own kicker. That was 4 games the Cowboys could have won that season. As for the 2014 season it's going just as I expected. I knew at the end of last season the Cowboys were headed for a losing season in 2014.

 

[CCBoy]

Not even close.

Clean up the trash, and I see real potential. 2010 was doomed from the very first pre season game. Remember the pre sea game at Houston? That team would've gotten 40 hung on em', prevent or not.

Naw, don't do a remake on history...

 

[ConstantReboot]

I don't know what Garrett has or doesn't have. Only those players know that. I'm on the outside looking in and from the outside looking in it looks like these guys like playing for Garrett. I don't look at guys on this team and say "Well t hey aren't playing hard". Most coaches lose their players by this time especially with a string of failure seasons.

You're spending too much time figuring out what's wrong with Garrett and ignoring some things he does well.

At least we can agree to disagree. I see players playing for a paycheck and for playing for a high profile teams like the Cowboys as the determining factor on why they play hard. Its not because of a rah rah coach that friendly towards the players. Jimmy, Parcells, even Landry had that demeanor to make their players play their best when they needed to. Players feared and respected these coaches. Garrett just not have that. Players like playing for Garrett because his friendly and nice doesn't cut it. He needs to be a coach that players better play hard or else I will cut you, bench you, slap you silly in front the team, etc. Thats what a real coach does in the NFL. Dallas Cowboys needs a real coach. They don't need a coach that is buddy, buddy with the players. Maybe thats why Romo never gets chewed out when he makes a mistake. He has a buddy for a coach that he can watch college basketball games with after the season.

 

[Beast_from_East]

What I think is similar is mostly that fans expect similar results. I don't see many similarities on the field, but I'd agree that Jason would be in danger of having the season get away from him if we start out with a three game losing streak. Let's hope we look good and win on Sunday.

If we start 0-3, that means we lost to the Titans and the Rams. It also means that the Saints and the Seahawks are 2 of our next 3 games so we are talking maybe 1-5 start assuming we beat the Texans in this scenario?

Sorry, but Garrett will not survive a 1-5 start, especially a coach in his 4th season, never posted a winning record, hated by the majority of the fan base, and in the last year of his contract....................no way he survives that.

 

[cowboyblue22]

I actually like garret but the results are not there for him to continue as coach when it come to games for the team to win and your in or games that if you will turn your team around such as beating the niners if they could of won that game makes huge difference in the season if and when the season get out of control and it will you will see these players quit on him.

 

[ConstantReboot]

Ok I don't want to get into the Garrett bashing here. It really does get me down to know that he could do much better as a person who is in a position of power. With much power comes much responsibility as the saying goes.

As you can see with that 2nd and 1 video Murray being frustrated for us not running the ball. Some people say that Wade lost the team in 2010. Well if the team started to become more frustrated and discontent on the direction of how this season is going, I can see us spiraling to 1-6 or 1-7.

If thats the case I don't Garrett lasting for too long. Now the question is how do we prevent a season from going downhill like its 2010? Simple. Garrett needs to be more accountable towards the action of his players - mainly Romo. If he does a boneheaded plays like what he did Garrett needs to lay it on Romo, whether its on film or behind close doors. The worst thing he can do is NOT DO ANYTHING.

Secondly, I would say put this entire season on the running game. Its our strength. Stop showing shotgun all the time. The play action hardly works with the shotgun. It was evident during the 2nd and 1 sequence.

 

[Idgit]

If we start 0-3, that means we lost to the Titans and the Rams. It also means that the Saints and the Seahawks are 2 of our next 3 games so we are talking maybe 1-5 start assuming we beat the Texans in this scenario?

Sorry, but Garrett will not survive a 1-5 start, especially a coach in his 4th season, never posted a winning record, hated by the majority of the fan base, and in the last year of his contract....................no way he survives that.

This is true. If we go 1-4 over the next 5 we will be 1-5.

 

[CowboysFaninHouston]

If you remember back to 2010, we had a very lackluster preseason as far as the starters go. It seems our intent that year was to just get to the regular season healthy. They sat players throughout training camp for even the smallest bumps and bruises. We scaled back practices to keep hitting to a minimum and Jerry got on Wade Phillips for making Jason Hatcher run sprints as punishment after Hatcher pulled a hamstring.

The 2010 Dallas Cowboys were ill prepared to start the season and their lack of physicality showed up early and often. They were also very weak mentally. It's absolutely no wonder we started that season 1-7. It wasn't until Jason Garrett took over in week 9 and immediately started having more padded practices that some of that physicality and toughness started to return. Unfortunately t was too little too late.

Fast forward to this year. We had many starters missing practices from day one. In one preseason game we had 27 players unavailable to play. That is ridiculous. Mo Claiborne once again took zero snaps in preseason. In contrast the Steelers had three consecutive practices in which all 90 players practiced. They started the season with every projected starter playing in the game against Cleveland.

Jason Garrett and Jerry Jones have coddled this team for far too long now. We almost encourage players to be and stay injured. This is totally opposed to the philosophy of Jimmy Johnson and Bill Parcells,. They knew it was a tough man's sport and weeded them out with tough practices and tough love (remember Parcells referring to Terry Glenn as "she" when asked about an injury to Glenn?).

I believe our starters did not get ample time in live action this preseason (especially Tony Romo) to be adequately prepared for the first quarter of the season, and right now I'm worried that we may see a very similar start to what we saw in 2010.

nah, its not that bad...that team didn't hit in practice, in fact Jerry didn't want them to have contact practices during the season because he was worried about injuries. wade caved in like a loose sand tunnel. the rest is history. plus 2010 was culmination of 3 previous years where players frustrations were bubbling and team was on a down ward spiral.

our defense will continue to struggle this year. you don't go from that craapy to good in one off season, with your top defensive draft pick and your star LB on the bench.

Romo was defintley off. he looked in preseason form. outside of that the team looked strong. OL, running game, even passing game once romo settled in. defense had good moments and bad...where last year it was one bad moment after another.

 

[CowboysFaninHouston]

Dallas needs to understand that JG has to go. His style at best produces mediocre results. A lot of coaches would coach here but sadly the GM is a control freak and cannot grade talent.

dallas is where coaches come to die. no coach will succeed under jerry jones. its not all garrett.....

 

[CowboysFaninHouston]

LOL.. Everybody that loves Garrett calls that GB during Wade's tenure as giving up, but none of them call the Chicago and Saints games last year as giving on Garrett. There were many times during Garrett's tenure that the team showed quit, until Romo bailed this team out putting them in contention with ridiculous QB play. Two years ago for example, Romo went on a ridiculous tear to put them in contention for the play-offs.

that was not giving up. that was getting your arse handed to you because of lack of talent on the team. last year's defense was bad. they went two whole games without making a single stop. giving up 3rd down after 3rd down. one of the worst defenses ever and everyone agrees that this defense had no talent. perhaps a one handed Ware and hatcher were the only good parts to it. the rest were street cast offs, players cut 4 times from other teams, etc. when one of our best players is selvie, who was cut twice...that should tell you about the talent on this team.

 

[Toruk_Makto]

Could not disagree more. This team acts hungry. To a man they all feel like they have something to prove. They were just hit in the face by abhorrent qb play and that was that.

And lack of physicality? Did that guy watch the lines? At all?

 

[ZappaFrank]

dallas is where coaches come to die. no coach will succeed under jerry jones. its not all garrett.....

Except for the last 2 coaches who actually made the playoffs. One with Quincy Carter, Troy Hambrick and Antonio Bryant as his big 3 on offense.

 

[Redball Express]

If you remember back to 2010, we had a very lackluster preseason as far as the starters go. It seems our intent that year was to just get to the regular season healthy. They sat players throughout training camp for even the smallest bumps and bruises. We scaled back practices to keep hitting to a minimum and Jerry got on Wade Phillips for making Jason Hatcher run sprints as punishment after Hatcher pulled a hamstring.

The 2010 Dallas Cowboys were ill prepared to start the season and their lack of physicality showed up early and often. They were also very weak mentally. It's absolutely no wonder we started that season 1-7. It wasn't until Jason Garrett took over in week 9 and immediately started having more padded practices that some of that physicality and toughness started to return. Unfortunately t was too little too late.

Fast forward to this year. We had many starters missing practices from day one. In one preseason game we had 27 players unavailable to play. That is ridiculous. Mo Claiborne once again took zero snaps in preseason. In contrast the Steelers had three consecutive practices in which all 90 players practiced. They started the season with every projected starter playing in the game against Cleveland.

Jason Garrett and Jerry Jones have coddled this team for far too long now. We almost encourage players to be and stay injured. This is totally opposed to the philosophy of Jimmy Johnson and Bill Parcells,. They knew it was a tough man's sport and weeded them out with tough practices and tough love (remember Parcells referring to Terry Glenn as "she" when asked about an injury to Glenn?).

I believe our starters did not get ample time in live action this preseason (especially Tony Romo) to be adequately prepared for the first quarter of the season, and right now I'm worried that we may see a very similar start to what we saw in 2010.

Hmmm...

This feels more like when Campo was in his last year with us..

..he was helping Jones clear out the overloaded cap..

..and getting rid of players past their primes.

And he knew the next HC was on his way.

Garrett is in exactly the same position.

Let's see..

what kind of job will he land in the NFL..?

He has failed as a HC, OC and Assistant Offensive coach..

anything left for him?

Enough Jones..stop the wildcat drilling with this franchise.

You have done it with Romo, done it with Phillips..

and done it with Garrett.

Stop trying to rebuild a once-proud franchise and fan base with retreads and never-quite-good enough

 

[AsthmaField]

At least we can agree to disagree. I see players playing for a paycheck and for playing for a high profile teams like the Cowboys as the determining factor on why they play hard. Its not because of a rah rah coach that friendly towards the players. Jimmy, Parcells, even Landry had that demeanor to make their players play their best when they needed to. Players feared and respected these coaches. Garrett just not have that. Players like playing for Garrett because his friendly and nice doesn't cut it. He needs to be a coach that players better play hard or else I will cut you, bench you, slap you silly in front the team, etc. Thats what a real coach does in the NFL. Dallas Cowboys needs a real coach. They don't need a coach that is buddy, buddy with the players. Maybe thats why Romo never gets chewed out when he makes a mistake. He has a buddy for a coach that he can watch college basketball games with after the season.

Well, the thing is, when we, as a person, look at Garrett, we see him through our own eyes. If you don't like him as a coach (and you don't seem to) then things he says in his pre game speeches, etc. is going to look and seem very different to you than it would to someone who respects and likes him. You might think they seem uninspired and trite, while someone else who thinks highly of Garrett listens intently and buys in to what he is saying.

By that same token, just because someone likes Garrett and thinks he's doing a good job with his team speeches doesn't mean that everyone views him in that light.

I like Garrett and I pull for him to do well and cement himself as the Dallas head coach going forward. I think he controls Jerry and his draft day itches just about better than anyone else ever has, including Jimmy and The Tuna. The direction he has taken the team since he took over is a very good one, IMO, and I want to see him continue to run the team and make it younger and more aggressive. He took over an old, tired team in 2010 and has given Dallas fans hope that he is building things the right way.

However, I might think a speech he gives the team is a very good one, and expect the team to respond favorably to it, while the truth could be that many on the team might not think as highly of him as I do and the speech seem hokey to them.

The point is that we, as fans, have our likes or dislikes of Garrett and his time as HC in Dallas, and that colors everything we see or hear from him. That doesn't mean that the players share a similar view as either one of us... or any particular fan.

What we kind of have to go on is how the team plays for him. Up to this point, the team has always seemed to play hard for him ever since Wade Phillips lost the same team at the beginning of 2010. To me, that early part of 2010 was a very clear indicator that the team had given up on Phillips and were ready for different leadership. I haven't seen anything close to that from the players in regards to Garrett's reign as HC here. They have always seemed to respond to him favorably and have played hard each year he has been the HC.

Had they quit on Garrett, none of the past years would have seen them at 8-8 and playing for a post season birth. I say that because I look at what Garrett has done personnel wise as a pretty much complete rebuild. Those usually don't go smoothly and 8-8 in the midst of a rebuild job is better than most.

Yes, they have had a franchise QB the whole time, but other than that, he has remade the whole roster pretty much. He inherited an old, overpriced OL and 4 years later we have a completely different OL with young, hungry, mobile, talented players all along it. There is even a little depth there. This year, he has had to completely rebuild the DL. Three years ago, the secondary was rebuilt (no matter if you like Claiborne and Carr... they still were not what Garrett started with). The LB's have completely changed as well.

It goes on. The RB position is completely different than in '10. The WR spot is entirely new, unless you count Dez as a Wade guy taken a few months before Phillips was fired. Even if you don't count Dez as a Garrett guy, every other WR is different now. Yeah, Witten has been here for a while, but Garrett brought in both of the other guys.

I see Garrett as a guy who came in to a team that had a good QB, TE, an old but good OLB/DE and another OLB/DE that was good but would end up with microfracture surgery on his knee soon, and a talented rookie WR at the beginning of 2010, and basically had to get the other 48 roster spots out the door and bring in new one's. Of course as it turned out, the two talented OLB's would only play 2011 and 2012 together, and really in 2012 Ware was hurt most of the time, so they too had to be replaced by 2013 (Spencer) and 2014 (Ware).

All of that, we asked Garrett to do while being expected to lead the team to the playoffs. In '11, '12, and '13 he won 8 games and had the team fighting for a playoff birth in their last game. Frankly, if you look at what he's had to do with the roster and coaching staff, it is a testimonial to how much the team works for him and listens to him that the bottom hasn't fallen out on the Cowboys record. And frankly, had somebody (anybody) managed to field an even average defense in any one of those 8-8 years, the team would have won more games and made the playoffs. Last season in particular was sabotaged by horrific defensive play that I doubt any team could have done much more than 8-8 with.

So anyway, yeah this post is too long, so I'll knock it off now... but to end it I will just say that I'd rather Dallas had ended up with 8-8 records for 3 years, get rid of the fat on the roster, and make the 53 look like fans used to always ask for it to, than to have kept any of the old, high priced players and squeeze out one more 10-6, first round playoff exit while continuing to screw up the salary cap and have Ware and Champ Bailey (as an example) finishing out old, stale careers taking Geritol with Jerry.

 

[Bleu Star]

If you remember back to 2010, we had a very lackluster preseason as far as the starters go. It seems our intent that year was to just get to the regular season healthy. They sat players throughout training camp for even the smallest bumps and bruises. We scaled back practices to keep hitting to a minimum and Jerry got on Wade Phillips for making Jason Hatcher run sprints as punishment after Hatcher pulled a hamstring.

The 2010 Dallas Cowboys were ill prepared to start the season and their lack of physicality showed up early and often. They were also very weak mentally. It's absolutely no wonder we started that season 1-7. It wasn't until Jason Garrett took over in week 9 and immediately started having more padded practices that some of that physicality and toughness started to return. Unfortunately t was too little too late.

Fast forward to this year. We had many starters missing practices from day one. In one preseason game we had 27 players unavailable to play. That is ridiculous. Mo Claiborne once again took zero snaps in preseason. In contrast the Steelers had three consecutive practices in which all 90 players practiced. They started the season with every projected starter playing in the game against Cleveland.

Jason Garrett and Jerry Jones have coddled this team for far too long now. We almost encourage players to be and stay injured. This is totally opposed to the philosophy of Jimmy Johnson and Bill Parcells,. They knew it was a tough man's sport and weeded them out with tough practices and tough love (remember Parcells referring to Terry Glenn as "she" when asked about an injury to Glenn?).

I believe our starters did not get ample time in live action this preseason (especially Tony Romo) to be adequately prepared for the first quarter of the season, and right now I'm worried that we may see a very similar start to what we saw in 2010.

Let's fire up the flux capacitors! It's going to be one incredible ride!

 

[AsthmaField]

This is true. If we go 1-4 over the next 5 we will be 1-5.

Nothing gets by you man...