Tony Romo Has To Be Better

[JoeKing]

Who needs to be better? Romo is the least of our worries. Improving the defense should be the focus. Do that and maintain the rest as it was in 2014... there won't be anyone we shouldn't beat. We are going to be playing a harder schedule but I welcome the challenge.

 

[Reality]

Looks like Romo knows what he's doing.

And if Romo had a team with the best defense the NFL has seen, or if the opposing team's quarterback had thrown 5 interceptions, or if a call against us had not happened, or a no-call against the opposing team had been made, he'd be playing the Super Bowl Right now. Great stats do not equate to winning. Great stats simply increase the statistical probability of winning. In addition, the fact that Romo leads something statistically does not mean he was perfect, nor does it mean he's impervious to mistakes, nor does it means there is no room for improvement in his game.

As I stated in my post which you selectively sliced and quoted, there's no disputing Romo had a great year and I would gladly take Romo's 2014 season for the 2015 season. That said, Romo was great and may never again be as good as he was this year, and yet the Cowboys could still win a Super Bowl.

In baseball, if a pitcher pitches a complete game one-hitter with no walks or errors, yet he loses the game because that one hit was a home run and his team was shut-out, there is logic in saying if the pitcher had been just a little better, his team might have won. He could have given up 3 runs, yet his team scored 4 runs without his help and his team would have won.

There's a huge difference between criticizing a player and simply saying the player could improve. Every player in the NFL could and should strive to improve next season. To counter that by saying the player was great, so there's no room for improvement, is to waste an opportunity.

The bottom line is that when a team loses, every player on that team should ask himself what could he have done better. That should happen no matter how well each player performed during the game. If the running back runs for 300 yards in a game and the team loses, maybe if he had not fumbled that one time, or missed a blocking assignment, etc., the team would have won. Maybe if the quarterback had dumped it off instead of taking a sack earlier in the game, it would have extended a drive helping to improve the field position advantage and maybe a touchdown by the opposing team on the following drive would have yielded a field goal instead, or maybe no score at all.

My point is that stats do not always reflect the true performance of a player and calling out other posters by mass tagging or mass selective quoting just wreaks of narrow-minded thinking.

 

[StarMan2112]

I'd say about half the sacks Romo took we're on him. A sack is not as bad as a pick, but he needs to do a better job at getting rid of the ball.

 

[Staubacher]

Tony just needs to hold the ball a long time on the plays that wind up working, and throw it away on the ones that don't.

I expect him to improve on foreseeing the future.

 

[Rockport]

Romo has been working on perfecting his craft since the day he signed his FA contract.

 

[percyhoward]

Great stats do not equate to winning.

They do provide some needed perspective though.

 

[Reality]

They do provide some needed perspective though.

I agree. Stats are always a good starting point and, as I said, the better the stats, the higher the statistical probability of success.

 

[LittleBoyBlue]

My ONLY complaint was the dumb sacks taken. If he can somehow find a way to get rid of the ball in those circumstances I'd be happy.

Bingo.

But after all these tears. That ain't changing,

We needed to score on one of those drives.



Here's the thing.

Every year he makes similar comments.
We were a bad call/no call away from one and done.

If we are all being honest about it.

 

[gimmesix]

He does need to work on throwing the ball away. He took some brutal sacks in the postseason waiting for guys to get open. Especially in the GB game. The ones in the Detroit game are kind of forgotten since we won but there was a few bad ones there, too.

Also, the lack of quicker routes just baffles me. We are sending WRs 12-15 yards down field on slow developing routes way too much and it forces Romo to sit back there and wait. Dez is so under utilized in this aspect of getting him the ball quick and in the slot. He runs the same stale routes over and over and it's very easy to take him out of the game i.e. both playoff games this year.

I really feel for Romo to get better, the team needs to work on the second half of what you've written. I don't really think we'll see much improvement, if any, in his numbers, but if we do a better job on the quick-hitting routes, especially against the blitz, we'll be more effective as a team.

 

[ufcrules1]

You are associating improvement with stats, which is not the only variable in the equation. There is always room for improvement no matter how good you are or how great you play.

Romo was great this year. There is no question about that. He had the best season of his career and he made a lot of great plays for the Cowboys this year. That said, there were times he fixated on one player and took a sack while waiting for them to get open even though another player was wide open. There are times he made adjustments to the play call at the line where it was a bad decision and there were times where he did not make adjustments to the play call and that was a bad decision. None of that detracts from the season Romo had. If you go back and look at the best quarterbacks in the league such as Brady, Rodgers, etc., you will find they made the same kinds of mistakes as well.

Personally, I'm glad to hear Romo say he needs to improve, but I would gladly take a repeat of 2014 Romo for next season.

Excellent freaking post. Yes, Romo had a fantastic year but could he have been better? Yes. You can look at the SF game, Washington game, first Philly game, etc. Playing better in any of those games could have put us in a great position to get the #1 seed and getting a bye / playing at home throughout the playoffs.

 

[ufcrules1]

And if Romo had a team with the best defense the NFL has seen, or if the opposing team's quarterback had thrown 5 interceptions, or if a call against us had not happened, or a no-call against the opposing team had been made, he'd be playing the Super Bowl Right now. Great stats do not equate to winning. Great stats simply increase the statistical probability of winning. In addition, the fact that Romo leads something statistically does not mean he was perfect, nor does it mean he's impervious to mistakes, nor does it means there is no room for improvement in his game.

As I stated in my post which you selectively sliced and quoted, there's no disputing Romo had a great year and I would gladly take Romo's 2014 season for the 2015 season. That said, Romo was great and may never again be as good as he was this year, and yet the Cowboys could still win a Super Bowl.

In baseball, if a pitcher pitches a complete game one-hitter with no walks or errors, yet he loses the game because that one hit was a home run and his team was shut-out, there is logic in saying if the pitcher had been just a little better, his team might have won. He could have given up 3 runs, yet his team scored 4 runs without his help and his team would have won.

There's a huge difference between criticizing a player and simply saying the player could improve. Every player in the NFL could and should strive to improve next season. To counter that by saying the player was great, so there's no room for improvement, is to waste an opportunity.

The bottom line is that when a team loses, every player on that team should ask himself what could he have done better. That should happen no matter how well each player performed during the game. If the running back runs for 300 yards in a game and the team loses, maybe if he had not fumbled that one time, or missed a blocking assignment, etc., the team would have won. Maybe if the quarterback had dumped it off instead of taking a sack earlier in the game, it would have extended a drive helping to improve the field position advantage and maybe a touchdown by the opposing team on the following drive would have yielded a field goal instead, or maybe no score at all.

My point is that stats do not always reflect the true performance of a player and calling out other posters by mass tagging or mass selective quoting just wreaks of narrow-minded thinking.

Another outstanding post. Stats are not the end all be all on how good a player is or if he has room to improve or not. Sure it does help put things into perspective but it doesn't account for everything. I personally did not like that Romo threw a low % deep pass on 4-2 with the game on the line. Sure, we did get robbed, that should have been a catch by Dez because he 100% did make a football move but regardless, Romo could have made an easy pitch and catch to Beasley who was wide open on that play and that is a much higher % play to keep the much needed drive alive. Now, that is something that doesn't show up in the stats. It's just a simple incomplete pass. There are many immeasurable stats out there. Players can always improve and Romo is not an exception to that rule.

 

[DFWJC]

I'd say about half the sacks Romo took we're on him. A sack is not as bad as a pick, but he needs to do a better job at getting rid of the ball.

I think he would agree. This is something somewhat new to him...being a bit more like Aaron Rodhers and erring on the cautious side regarding throwaways and sacks.

But yes,normally one interception may equal about 6-7 sacks....the harm is not remotely comparable on average.

You avoid a pick, a fumble, or a grounding penalty with a sack...maybe even a holding penalty as well. Those are some of the most devastating things that can happen. You can take a sack and still end up scoring a TD, a FG , or just getting a first down. It's not ideal, but odds wise it is a very smart alternative much of the time.

 

[ElGatoGrande]

When you look only at Romo's sacks and compare them to incompletions, obviously the incompletion is the preferred option. But when you look at every one of Romo's drop backs (not just the sacks), and compare them to every other quarterback's drop backs in the playoffs, you can see the decided advantage of his performance over those of the other QB.

Adjusted net yards per attempt looks at all drop backs (completions, incompletions, interceptions, throwaways, and sacks). Here is how Romo compared to all other playoff QB.

pass yards - sack yards + (20 x TD) - (45 x INT) / (attempts + sacks)

Romo 8.2
Flacco 7.6
Brady 6.9
Rodgers 6.4
Stafford 6.3
Wilson 5.7
Newton 5.3
Luck 5.3
Manning 4.6
Rthlsbrgr 4.1
Lindley -0.9
Dalton 3.8

If you don't think ANY/A has anything to do with winning football games, just know that passer rating has the highest win correlation of any major individual stat. One of the criticisms of passer rating is that it doesn't include sacks and sack yardage. Well, ANY/A does. It isn't talked about as much as passer rating, and it's hard sometimes to find the data without really digging. Although regular-season ANY/A can be found at PFR, I had to do my own work for the playoff ANY/A.

This study looked at 22 NFL seasons and found ANY/A to have a slightly higher correlation to wins than even passer rating.

Adam's version of the above stat does not include touchdowns, going by the theory that passing touchdowns are worth no more than the yards it takes to get them. Here's ANY/A without TD for this year's playoffs:

Romo 6.9
Flacco 6.0
Stafford 5.8
Brady 5.5
Rodgers 5.3
Luck 4.8
Wilson 4.3
Manning 4.2
Rthlsbrgr 3.7
Dalton 3.8
Newton 2.7
Lindley -1.4


Looks like Romo knows what he's doing.

I wonder if a bunch of stats thrown together will change Garrett's stated desire for Romo not to eat the football when he doesn't have to?

 

[Bullflop]

I think Romo is just about as objective as any individual can be about his own personal performance as he can possibly be. He's been around long enough and been through enough to know what he needs to do to get to where this team needs to go. Nobody wants to succeed more than he does and it's plain to see in everything he does on a daily basis. He'll study his performance on film and it's a good bet he'll do what the staff and his own knowledge leads him to accept as a solution to his mistakes. I could easily picture him playing his best ball in whatever remains of his career as long as his health permits it.

 

[SDCowboy]

I'm gonna say it again...we're gonna miss this guy when he's gone.

 

[Tusan_Homichi]

I'm gonna say it again...we're gonna miss this guy when he's gone.

Just watch about any NFL game that doesn't involve the Cowboys and save for maybe 5 other QBs (probably less than that after this year), you're left thinking man, we're pretty lucky here.

The odds are not in your favor at finding another QB as good as Romo. The next guy could be Matt Ryan. The next guy could be Matthew Stafford. Or, on the other hand, he could be Tom Brady or Peyton Manning. Hell, I didn't even mention the terrible QBs that the new guy could turn out to be like. You just don't know, but again, the odds aren't really in your favor. Romo is REALLY good.

 

[burmafrd]

Excellent freaking post. Yes, Romo had a fantastic year but could he have been better? Yes. You can look at the SF game, Washington game, first Philly game, etc. Playing better in any of those games could have put us in a great position to get the #1 seed and getting a bye / playing at home throughout the playoffs.

you are so predictable. Romo had one of the greatest years any QB could ask for but your pathological hatred of him cannot let it go.

 

[burmafrd]

I will take a sack anytime over a pick. Those crying about the sacks would be screaming about more picks. With Romo that is the choice you have- a pick or a sack because he will never change holding onto the ball trying for a big play.

 

[DallasInDC]

Just watch about any NFL game that doesn't involve the Cowboys and save for maybe 5 other QBs (probably less than that after this year), you're left thinking man, we're pretty lucky here.

The odds are not in your favor at finding another QB as good as Romo. The next guy could be Matt Ryan. The next guy could be Matthew Stafford. Or, on the other hand, he could be Tom Brady or Peyton Manning. Hell, I didn't even mention the terrible QBs that the new guy could turn out to be like. You just don't know, but again, the odds aren't really in your favor. Romo is REALLY good.

This is so true. I never understood what the anti-romo crowd wanted as an alternate? there has. not been a single qb that has come out in the past eight years that theCowboys could have drafted that is better than Romo. There has been only 1 FA (manning) available who you could consider as good as Romo and he never would have lasted behind our pre 2014 OL. the reality is there are maybe 5 QBs you would consider as a replacement for Romo and none of them were ever available. This fact alone shows how fortunate we have been for the last eight years to have Romo

 

[Blackspider214]

I really feel for Romo to get better, the team needs to work on the second half of what you've written. I don't really think we'll see much improvement, if any, in his numbers, but if we do a better job on the quick-hitting routes, especially against the blitz, we'll be more effective as a team.

Exactly. I think this is a Garrett thing. No matter who the play caller is, we run the same types of routes. The only person we really utilize on the quick routes is Beasley. It's easy to take away a WR if you just keep lining him outside and allow the defense to bracket him the whole game. Hard to do that when you move him all over the place. The passing game is very vanilla at times.

And yes, the blitz kills us so much because we don't adjust accordingly. We keep running the same slow developing routes down the field.