When asked at Monday’s press conference about the team’s routine December decline, coach Wade Philips lost his cool a bit, of course blaming the perception on the media.
No, I don’t think it’s a mental block. I think it’s something you made up.
Made up? Hmmmm. Since Tony Romo became the starting quarterback of the team, they are 5-9 (36%) in the last month of the season; They are 31-8 (79%) in the first three months of the season. Last season they just needed to go 2-3 in December to go to the playoffs; they didn’t. Just take a look at their remaining schedule this season: San Diego (9-3), @ New Orleans (12-0), @ Washington (3-9), Philadelphia (8-4). The Cowboys will have to win at least two of those games to win the division and probably need to win two to go to the playoffs.
A debate’s also erupted in Dallas about whether the Cowboys are “winners.”
Well, they’ve won eight games and they’ve lost four. That’s where we are. I don’t think we have a team of losers.
How do you define that term? Coach Phillips thinks they are “winners” because they’ve won more games this season than they’ve lost. I think they’re a bunch of losers. Not a single player on the Cowboys has won a Super Bowl, and the only coach on the staff to have won a Super Bowl was back when the Cowboys were a very different team (with Aikman, Irvin and Smith). Only two players on the team ever won a BCS title, and I don’t believe either of them was a starter when they did. I don’t know how you call that track record the resume of “winners.”
on Dec 8th, 2009 at 6:38 PM
Multiply these
by about a hundred thousand. 
on Dec 8th, 2009 at 7:07 PM
While I’ll agree that this crop of cowboys players and coaches haven’t done anything in recent years when it mattered, the cowboys have been bad in december for more than just Tony Romo’s time. They haven’t won a playoff game since 1996. That was when Troy was still QB. They’ve gone through lots of QBs since then (Anthony Wright, Ryan Leaf, Clint Stoener, Quincy Carter, Chad Hutchinson, Vinny Testaverde, Drew Henson, Drew Bledsoe). This smells to me as Cowboys haters piling on. Go ahead, but it makes you seem a little small. You don’t seem to pile on the Packers, or Dolphins, or 49ers, or…
on Dec 8th, 2009 at 10:06 PM
Cesar, I think we pile on plenty. Maybe you haven’t seen our blog or discussion board postings about Patriots, Browns, Colts, Vikings, Lions…
on Dec 9th, 2009 at 11:42 AM
Wow- the Cowboys play their next game against the Chargers, with Philip Rivers going 15-0 in December as the starting QB…
Not a good way to start he month.
on Dec 9th, 2009 at 9:35 PM
Wow. Tony Romo will be holding kicks this Sunday. Remember last time that happened? In the 2006 playoffs at Seattle? Wade’s genius insight into the situation:
“We feel like we need to do something,” Cowboys coach Wade Phillips said. “I just think something new for our kicker would maybe help him mentally, I guess.”
Now that’s leadership!