Last weekend, the Dallas Cowboys suffered a dramatic overtime loss to their division rival, the Philadelphia Eagles. This past weekend, the Cowboys suffered an ugly loss to the lowly Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Since Tony Romo suffered a broken clavicle in Dallas’s Week 2 matchup in Philadelphia, the Cowboys have lost seven straight games.
They’ve faced some formidable foes over that period, including an unbeaten New England Patriots team that’s well on its way to hoisting another Lombardi Trophy. They also faced a red-hot Atlanta Falcons team in Week 3, though the Falcons have come back to Earth since starting the year 5-0, dropping three of their past four games.
However, over that stretch, the Cowboys should have easily won at least two games. They gave the disappointing New Orleans Saints their first win of the season (in overtime). They only lost to the brutally underwhelming Seattle Seahawks by one point — a 13-12 loss at Cowboys Stadium. This isn’t to say that anyone expected the Romo-less Cowboys to beat last year’s NFC Champs, but it was a winnable game.
Over the past several years, Tony Romo and the Cowboys have often been the brunt of several jokes. And for a while, I was often the one making them and laughing at the team. But after observing how bad Dallas is without Romo, I believe those jokes may have been misdirected.
Romo is no stranger to injury. His injury history includes: a sprained finger in 2008 resulting in two missed games; a separated shoulder in 2010 resulting in 10 missed games; a herniated disc in 2013 resulting in the end of his season; and a fracture in his back in 2014 resulting in one missed game.
Romo’s track record of injuries, in turn, means that the Cowboys are no strangers to backup quarterbacks. And to say that Romo’s backups have been subpar would be an understatement.
His backups over the past seven years include Brad Johnson, Jon Kitna, Brandon Weeden and Matt Cassel. Kitna was Romo’s best backup — during Kitna’s nine starts with Dallas during the 2010 season, he racked up more than 2,000 passing yards and 16 touchdowns, all while posting a career-high 88.9 passer rating. Despite those strong statistics, he still only went 4-5 over his nine starts, until he himself was injured in Week 16. His backup, Stephen McGee, was called upon in the season finale that year, a 14-13 win over the Eagles. That would be McGee’s only start in the NFL.
Weeden has started four games for the Cowboys over the past two seasons, and has not won a single one. In actuality, though, he has not played bad football. His stats for Dallas have been competitive, and arguably very good for a backup. For example, Weeden threw for 739 yards and two touchdowns in four games (three starts) this season, all while posting a 92.2 passer rating. However, he went 0-3 in his three starts this year, leading the Cowboys to change starters and go with Matt Cassel following their bye in Week 6.
When the Cowboys first acquired Cassel this year, owner Jerry Jones raved about how talented his newfound quarterback was. Recall in 2008, when Tom Brady suffered a torn ACL and MCL, Cassel led the New England Patriots to an 11-5 season. Despite Cassel’s very apparent skill set, he has been winless with Dallas so far this year. The fact of the matter is that the Cowboys have looked ugly without Romo, and were favorites to win the pathetic NFC East with him.
Think back to the 2010 Peyton Manning-less Indianapolis Colts. Without their quarterback, the Colts went 2-14, en route to drafting Andrew Luck first overall, despite being just two years removed from an AFC Championship title.
Now, Tony Romo is not Peyton Manning. The latter has a Super Bowl ring, Super Bowl MVP, the most passing yards of all time and the most passing touchdowns of all time. Where Manning is one of the single most decorated and celebrated athletes of all time, Romo has just two playoff wins in nine seasons.
Tony Romo is an elite quarterback. He makes players around him better, as proven by the difference in Dallas’s expectations with and without him. He is as important to his team as Tom Brady is to the Patriots, as Aaron Rodgers is to the Green Bay Packers and as Manning is to the Denver Broncos.
The strangest thing is that at 2-7, the Dallas Cowboys are not entirely eliminated from the playoff picture. Due to the pitiful nature of the NFC East this year, Dallas is barely behind the division-leading New York Giants. Furthermore, the Cowboys could realistically win their next seven games, with Romo set to come back Sunday against the Miami Dolphins.
And if Romo leads Dallas to the postseason this year, I highly doubt he will be at the receiving end of any more jokes.
