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Bob Sturm: Cowboys' loss shows Brandon Weeden is out of his league
Overall thoughts
They needed to play mistake-free and not give away anything today to have a chance to beat a pretty good football team. Despite a lot of things going well in the early going, it was not close to a clean performance to end the day happy. The defense was disappointing. Most of us expected the offense to be disappointing. The defense had no answer to the Falcons' run game -- that we certainly did not fear entering the day -- and all of the problems Julio Jones causes. And put those together you have what you have: a very disappointing result and a second half where the Cowboys were beat up pretty badly on both sides of the ball.
Brandon Weeden didn't attempt many passes downfield; rate his performance
You can tell either Weeden or the coaches or both don't want him making any throws that would be regarded as medium or high levels of difficulty. He threw 26 passes and I remember (two long ones) -- the seam route to Jason Witten, that was a high pass and a slant to Terrance Williams. Otherwise everything was within five yards of the line of scrimmage, and the Falcons adjusted appropriately. Once that happened, the Cowboys had an offense that had zero explosiveness. They were going to have to run the football right down the Falcons throats, and the Falcons would not have that. They stacked the box and quieted that idea in the second half.
Should the Cowboys have thrown more downfield?
Yes. Oh yes. That was their only chance -- catch the Falcons not taking their passing game seriously. And the time to try that is first down. I am pretty sure they never passed on first and they were pretty clear with their gameplan, which was try to work with a quarterback who can't run an NFL offense very well. The more we think about it, we should have seen that last week when they traded for Matt Cassel. Not that Cassel can do magic tricks. They were pretty sure what Brandon Weeden could not do.
Is there QB controversy now?
I'm not sure it's a controversy as much as it's trying to survive and win a few games between now and Nov. 22 (when Tony Romo is slated to return). There certainly is some hesitancy to be running Weeden out there many more times. You just cant have a 21-7 lead and throw that interception, and you can't slide in the backfield when you're down to your last chance and try to avoid contact. That probably right there, that play where it's third down and short and he's sliding for self-preservation, that will leave the coaches looking quickly into alternatives.
On the Cowboys' defense:
The Falcons, entering the game, decided to challenge the Cowboys defense physically. They lined up with a fullback and wanted some power runs right into the teeth of the Cowboys. As they hop on an airplane and head back to Georgia with a win, that was pretty successful all day long. That of course led to some favorable third down situations where they could use Jones to make the Cowboys secondary look rather hapless. So that two-pronged attack probably led many of us to curb our enthusiasm about the upgrades on the Cowboys defense until they receive help from reinforcements.
What should fans take away heading into a game next week at New Orleans, which might not have Drew Brees?
The takeaway is this is going to be very difficult without Romo and Dez Bryant. It places a massive premium on getting that win next Sunday against New Orleans, if the idea is to try to be near .500 when Romo returns, it's possible the season might depend on next Sunday night. I doubt the Patriots and Seahawks (two future Cowboys opponents) will have a tough time with this offense.
Overall thoughts
They needed to play mistake-free and not give away anything today to have a chance to beat a pretty good football team. Despite a lot of things going well in the early going, it was not close to a clean performance to end the day happy. The defense was disappointing. Most of us expected the offense to be disappointing. The defense had no answer to the Falcons' run game -- that we certainly did not fear entering the day -- and all of the problems Julio Jones causes. And put those together you have what you have: a very disappointing result and a second half where the Cowboys were beat up pretty badly on both sides of the ball.
Brandon Weeden didn't attempt many passes downfield; rate his performance
You can tell either Weeden or the coaches or both don't want him making any throws that would be regarded as medium or high levels of difficulty. He threw 26 passes and I remember (two long ones) -- the seam route to Jason Witten, that was a high pass and a slant to Terrance Williams. Otherwise everything was within five yards of the line of scrimmage, and the Falcons adjusted appropriately. Once that happened, the Cowboys had an offense that had zero explosiveness. They were going to have to run the football right down the Falcons throats, and the Falcons would not have that. They stacked the box and quieted that idea in the second half.
Should the Cowboys have thrown more downfield?
Yes. Oh yes. That was their only chance -- catch the Falcons not taking their passing game seriously. And the time to try that is first down. I am pretty sure they never passed on first and they were pretty clear with their gameplan, which was try to work with a quarterback who can't run an NFL offense very well. The more we think about it, we should have seen that last week when they traded for Matt Cassel. Not that Cassel can do magic tricks. They were pretty sure what Brandon Weeden could not do.
Is there QB controversy now?
I'm not sure it's a controversy as much as it's trying to survive and win a few games between now and Nov. 22 (when Tony Romo is slated to return). There certainly is some hesitancy to be running Weeden out there many more times. You just cant have a 21-7 lead and throw that interception, and you can't slide in the backfield when you're down to your last chance and try to avoid contact. That probably right there, that play where it's third down and short and he's sliding for self-preservation, that will leave the coaches looking quickly into alternatives.
On the Cowboys' defense:
The Falcons, entering the game, decided to challenge the Cowboys defense physically. They lined up with a fullback and wanted some power runs right into the teeth of the Cowboys. As they hop on an airplane and head back to Georgia with a win, that was pretty successful all day long. That of course led to some favorable third down situations where they could use Jones to make the Cowboys secondary look rather hapless. So that two-pronged attack probably led many of us to curb our enthusiasm about the upgrades on the Cowboys defense until they receive help from reinforcements.
What should fans take away heading into a game next week at New Orleans, which might not have Drew Brees?
The takeaway is this is going to be very difficult without Romo and Dez Bryant. It places a massive premium on getting that win next Sunday against New Orleans, if the idea is to try to be near .500 when Romo returns, it's possible the season might depend on next Sunday night. I doubt the Patriots and Seahawks (two future Cowboys opponents) will have a tough time with this offense.
