Four weeks into the NFL season, there are teams that have proven to be surprises, and others that haven’t lived up to their advance billing, Jerry Jones was saying Sunday evening.
The 4-0 Broncos fit into the former category. Meanwhile, Jones’ Cowboys not only can be counted among the latter, but are perilously close to fitting into an even more alarming grouping: nonfactors.
“I’ve been in this league 12 years and there’s one thing that I’ve learned. These (games) are precious,” linebacker Keith Brooking said after Dallas’ record fell to 2-2 with a 17-10 loss to Denver. “As good a team as we have, with the talent that we’ve got, we can’t give away games that we feel we should win. No offense to Denver — they’ve got a good team — but this can’t happen.”
Jones was quick to give the Broncos credit, but in the visitors’ locker room there was also an equal measure of confusion as to how Dallas let this game slip away. Why was it, for example, a Cowboys team that led the NFL in rushing, averaging more than 190 yards a game, could total only 74 on Sunday?
Similarly, Dallas quarterback Tony Romo had been sacked only three times in the Cowboys’ first three games. On Sunday, he was dropped five times.
Even so, the most stupefying thing for the visitors was this: When it was time for the game to be won with a big play, either offensively or defensively, it was the Broncos who came up aces, most notably on the 51-yard touchdown pass from Kyle Orton to Brandon Marshall with 1:46 left.
“The bottom line is we didn’t play well enough to win,” Brooking said. “If you play 65 snaps and play great for 64 of them and then give up a touchdown on the 65th, then you didn’t get the job done.”
Of course, Dallas had a chance to tie the score, driving to the Denver 2-yard line, but two passes in the final nine seconds went awry. The Cowboys were shut out in the final three quarters.
“Obviously, we knew that any kind of points that we could have gotten would have helped out tremendously,” Romo said. “It was frustrating that we weren’t able to do it.”
Now the Cowboys, one of the NFL’s darlings and once a favorite to make some noise in the postseason, has to deal with questions on whether they are a legitimate playoff team. At first glance, the schedule seems to be favorable. On Sunday, Dallas faces winless Kansas City and after a bye, hosts Atlanta and Seattle.
“I know we’re going to stay together as a team, but we have to show how bad we want it,” Brooking said. “That will happen on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. You win games on Sunday by how you practice, and now we have to be desperate.”
Anthony Cotton: 303-954-1292 or acotton@denverpost.com
