Time to move on.

This team is falling apart at the seams. There are so many things wrong with this team, I don't even know where to start. I do know that the guy that bought the groceries and cooked the meal, has to take the blame when the customer starts vomiting at the table from food poisoning.

I've been saying week after week that the coaching staff is not putting these players in position to succeed... and that is becoming more evident these last few games. The failure to deviate from a tired philosophy on defense has run it's course here in Dallas. It's time to move on because Bill Parcells will not change. He has had plenty of time to put his stamp on this team... I believe there are just a handful of players on this team that have not been hand-picked by him. The result is an underachieving team that has worsened as the season has gone on. Even though they have a winning record, they have been exposed repeatedly during the season and teams now have a blue-print on how to beat the Cowboys. These are his guys. This is his philosophy. He must be held accountable for the results.

Yes, we have secured a playoff spot, but does anyone believe that this team is anywhere close to being a true contender? I am glad to hear that Jerry Jones said after the game that he is as disgusted as he has been in 17 years with this team. I have to say this is the most frustrating Cowboy team that I have watched as well. In past years, the expectations weren't there, but they have and should be now. He said that it starts at the very top. I am hoping that he sees what his micro-managing head coach is doing to this team. I'm hoping that he sees that a change is needed.

I was elated when the Cowboys first lured Parcells to Dallas. Finally, a football guy with skins on the wall that can transform this team into a contender. And while he has added some high-end talent to this team, his shortcomings as a modern day head coach have turned this into a wash. For every 2 steps forward with him, we always seem to take 2 steps back because of him. It's time for a new regime here in Dallas and we need someone to lead this team who has the future in mind... a youthful luminary that isn't contemplating retirement from year to year. We need a change.

- S

Hate to Say I Told You So

Last week, I expressed great concern over our defense - even in light of a win - but like a lot of people, I saw this coming.

This defense flat out sucks. Some argue it's the coaches and some say the players, but I say it's the perfect storm of suck on all counts.

1.) Parcells. When he first became HC, Parcells didn't want to mess with a good thing, because Zimmer had, I believe, the #1 defense in the league the year before with the 4-3. After a few down years on defense (with OK talent), Parcells reverted to what he knew and MADE Zimmer, a life-long 4-3 guy, learn the 3-4 instead of bringing in an experienced 3-4 guy. Why? Who knows. Jerry maybe? Anyway, after the supposed BIG draft with Ware (whom many predicted to be a DE), Spears and Canty, the Cowboys appeared to have, IMO, the talent to actually stick with the 4-3 given the LB corps of Dat, Coakley and James at MLB, but Parcells demanded the 3-4 with an on-the-job trainee in Zimmer. Bad mistake.

That said, there's NO WAY Parcells gives the keys to Zimmer without looking over his shoulder, this is HIS handpicked defensive blueprint, so he should be held accountable for the porous defensive gameplans which includes obvious blitzes in obvious blitzing downs.

Any coincidence that once Sean Payton got out from underneath Parcells that his offense leads the league? Similar QB styles in Romo and Brees - Brees just has more experience, similar 2-back offense - Bush just more explosive than Julius, and actually lesser, IMO, receiving corps with Saints, yet much more imaginative playcalling. Think the ass-kicking the Saints gave the Boys was Payton's way of saying, "see old man, I TOLD you my stuff would work if you just let me do my thing without giving me so much grief?"

2.) Zimmer. As mentioned before, he learned the 3-4 on the job, but after supposedly "studying" all the great 3-4 defenses/coordinators, don't you think he could come up with something a little more imaginative than blitzing Roy up the middle on 3rd and long? He's just clueless.

He would've melted down on national TV had his one designated pass rusher, Ware, been seriously injured. "What, you mean someone other than 94 rushes the QB? Complete System Failure."

3.) Players. I take it all back - Roy's actually a very good SS and deserves all the accolades he receives. I love how he takes charge and shows up every week. One tackle with the division on the line? Hawaii here we come!

Bradie James looks lost and gets whipped a lot. How many tackles can a LB make 8 yards down the field?

Marcus Spears? Did he even dress for the game?

Canty, Adoyle, Henry (good pic though), Singleton (how many times can a 10-year vet let a runner get outside)? Please.

Didn't this defense have the dreaded "players only meeting" this week?

And THIS is what we get out of these players, WITH THE FREAKING DIVISION on the line? Over FOUR HUNDRED FREAKING YARDS OF OFFENSE for the Eagles?!?!? It's disgusting, and these dudes should NEVER hear the name Doomsday mentioned with their names again.

I'll never get how athletes, paid or not, can go out and give nothing with a championship (albeit a division championship) on the line, but again, I'm not off to my multi-million dollar mansion to ponder it all so, sadly, all I can do is vent.

Few other notes:

• T.O. said that if asked, he'd become a more vocal leader, but that the team should understand he'd brutally honest and that might be hard for some to take.

Are you freaking kidding me? You think if someone chewed his a$$ everytime he dropped a pass that he'd think, "well, that's a tough pill to swallow, but thanks for being a great leader?" What a freaking hypocrite.

Also, he said (AGAIN) that he needs to get involved earlier in the game. Please. If the team who is giving you "25 million reasons" to play but decides to only call your number once a game, it's up to you to be a professional, acknowledge said 25 million reasons, and CATCH THE DAMN BALL WHENEVER it's thrown to you —— no matter what.

• Tony Romo needs to get back to playing like a first-year starter and not like a guy who thinks he's the next Farve —— quickly leading him to become the next Mark Rypien or Don Majkowski. Get your head out of the clouds.

• Said it week 4 - the offensive line is good against bad teams and awful against good ones. Explain to me again why we signed Marco Rivera over Mike Wahle?

• Parcells might want to direct his "evil" stares at a few other guys other than Miles Austin (who was wrong, but come on).

Hey Parcells, it ain't your rookie kick returner who's quitting on you. It's all the guys to whom YOU gave ringing endorsements (and lots 'o cash) — Roy, Bradie, Spears, Canty, Rivera, Adams, Owens (this one's on Jerry), Henry, Keith Davis et al.

-M

Nice, but...

Nice win against a desperate opponent, but it was way too close for me. This may be, for me, the most frustrating Cowboys team that I have watched in a long time. I know there were some awful teams under Campo, but we didn't expect much for those teams, so it wasn't too surprising when they stunk.

This team, however, came into the season with high expectations with some, like Peter King, predicting them to go to the Super Bowl, and I bought into the expectations, hook, line and sinker. Even better, when our statuesque QB Bledsoe was replaced with a younger, more athletic Romo, after some initial hesitation, I became even more excited about the SuperBowl aspirations.

Some predicted that this defense was the third coming of Doomsday, and I remained excited, but after watching the games, I'm having a lot of concerns. I HOPE that this team will win it all, but I just don't like what I'm seeing on defense.

It all starts with the coaches, and they play the worst 3-4 scheme I've ever seen.

Outside of Ware, Ferguson and Newman, I'm not so sure this team deserves any accolades. Collectively, I just don't see the fire or desire that I would hope our defense so-called "Doomsday III" would have. It just seems that when the opposing offense gets the first shot, this defense stays down, and I hate it. No one seems to stand up and say, WITH THEIR PLAY AND NOT THEIR MOUTHS, that "the buck stops here" or "I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take anymore" or "don't bring that $@#% in here" or "here I come to save the day!" Nobody. Geez, we made Michael Freaking Vick look like Joe Montana! When was the last time this team made a big play when they NEEDED to make a big, crunch-time play?

Sure, in pre and post-game interviews, Bradie James seems to SAY the right things, but during the game, he seems to disappear and when he does make a tackle, it's usually 8-10 yards down the field. He reminds me of Eugene Lockhart, which isn't good.

Anthony Henry was paid a lot of money to come in here to get beat at least once or twice a game.

Marcus Spears is playing nowhere near to his 1st-round status.

Canty was supposed to be a 1st-round talent, but isn't close.

At the other OLB, we desperately miss Greg Ellis opposite of Ware. Perhaps Carpenter can play up to his draft status.

Then, there are the safeties. Wow. Free Safeties are so bad collectively, that I can't even comment on them.

Finally, I've been on Roy's case since his rookie year, and it seems that a lot of people are getting on my bandwagon, but the truth is that I WANT him to play up to his All-Pro status. He just seems incapable. As a fan, I want all Cowboys players to be studs, but I just can't stand how he covers, how he disappears for extended periods of time, and perhaps most of all, how he pouts when someone asks him about his play or the teams play. He acts like a 3-year old. He's supposed to be the LEADER of this defense, and he can't even man-up and say "You're right, I have stunk, but that's over damn it. No more!" Instead, he whines and says how people are too hard on him.

News flash Roy — you're the highest paid player on our team, and you're supposedly an All-Pro, so if we can't look to you when times are tough, WHO do we look to?

I don't mean to be so negative after a win and clinching a playoff spot, but the truth is that I'm looking down the road. Now that the QB spot has been secured, I really believe that this team has a chance IF the defense can't finally play up to the expectations.

Other thoughts:

• I'm no coach, but after watching the game a few times, it appears to me that the failure to cover the FB at the goaline is on the ILB's. It appears that they want Ware to rush the QB which leaves the FB for the other 'backers. To me, it looked like Fowler was at fault on the 1st TD and James on the 2nd.

• I've been Julius' fan for a long time, but it's now time to make Barber the lead and Jones the changeup. Again, Barber seems to break tackles that Jones can't. It looked like on one carry in particular that Jones could've taken it to the house had he broken a shoestring tackle.

• Love T.O.'s game, but can't stand the man.

• Rivera just isn't very good anymore.

• Sure the defense has been bad, but some young guys like Hatcher, Coleman, Ratliff and some flashes of Carpenter look good.

• Romo stepped up after a bad game. Nice.

-M

Cowboy's Clinch!

Well, they clinched a playoff spot today. Congrats to the Cowboy's for turning the season around for the most part and getting into the big dance. It remains to be seen if the Boy's have a team that has what it takes to take it the distance. Offensively, I think they have the ingredients to be a contender, but they seem to win games like this in spite of their defensive play. I really think the Saints game exposed them quite a bit to other teams in the mix.

The Christmas Day game will give us a good barometer of where we are at as a team. This is a huge game with the Division on the line. We haven't faired too well in situations like this where we have the chance to shut the door for good. Trust me... this game will be an all-out battle. Forget the lines. Forget the injuries. Forget the home field advantage. The Eagles are a team that is sparked by their emotional style of play and they are capable of pouncing on teams that may look better on paper. I don't think that the Cowboy's will be overconfident... they really have no reason to be. But I hope that Bill Parcells has them ready and I hope they understand the magnitude of this game.

The bottom line is, the Cowboy's defense needs to show up and prove to themselves that they can be a true playoff contender. If they can get some momentum and confidence going into the playoffs, then you never know what can happen. They have to be up for this game... and Philly is the type of team that plays to win, while it seems that the Cowboy's sometimes play not to lose.

- S

Good read here.

I had to post this breakdown of the Cowboys defense that was posted on a message board by a poster named "ConstantReboot." This guy is "spot-on" with his thoughts on the problems the Cowboys are having on the defensive side of the ball. Enjoy.

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I want to once and for all clarify why I hate Zimmers defense. I don't hate the man. I just hate how he makes this team play defense. Its his stupid scheme called the zone coverage that I really, really hate.

Zimmer's mainstay defense is the zone coverage defense. It seems that its played about 95% of the time. Once in a while he would blitz a linebacker, but our basic defense is zone coverage and rushing 4 men during passing downs. Now think about....why would you play a zone when you have one of the best man to man cover corner in football and a pretty good #2 corner in Henry?

My opinion is that our zone defense is the defenses major weakness. Here is why:

1. It doesn't play up to our players talent and abilities. We all know that Roy is better close to the LOS. We also know that Newman is as close as there is to a shutdown corner. We also have a pretty good #2 corner in Henry.

However, Roy is not really that great in coverage. If so why do we play a zone scheme or even a 2 deep zone with Roy going deep covering the other teams best recievers? Why can't we go man to man coverage with our corners running stride for stride with the receivers downfield? Its harder and seems more complicated to have our corners pass off receivers to the safeties in a zone coverage and it just has hard to figure out who is supposed to be covering who. Lets face it. The zone defense looks good on paper. But it doesn't work.

2. When we play zone, our linebackers play 10 feet back from the LOS. Then when the ball is snap, they backtrack further away from the LOS and go into coverage. Why? Linebackers in a 3-4 are more effective closer to the line than in pass coverage. The zone makes our linebackers play to what the offense is showing. We need to disquise our blitzes and have the possibility of blitzing our linebackers from anywhere.

3. Lastly, this is the same zone defense that Zimmer runs year after year. There has been no changes to this scheme whatsoever. Even when Miami blitzed us with a no name QB in 2003 it was the same defense. This makes this zone defense easier to score against. Easier to gameplan and basically easier to play against.

The only difference is that we now run a 3-4 alignment. But the philosophy of that bend but don't break zone defense is still ingrained into this defense.

We need to dump this foolish zone defense into the trash.

We need to mix up the defense by going to a man to man pressure type of defense.

Make Newman shadow the opponents best reciever. Give Henry safety help deep. This should free up Roy Williams to come closer to the LOS. Use Burnett more into coverage....especially, those runningbacks and TEs that come out into the flat.

Allow Burnett to shadow some of the other teams best runningbacks such as Tiki Barber and Reggie Bush. We are totally under utilizing Burnett's cover skills by having him sit on the bench and he can take over cover duties for Ware.

Move Ware around. Allow him free reign in rushing the passer. The offense will send their best runningback out in the flat to expose Ware's passrushing. We can then counter that by bringing Burnett to cover the runningback.

Alternate Ratliff and Hatcher like we alternate Jones/Barber. At least it makes it harder for teams to gameplan when we have different personnel all the time. And it gives Spears/Canty resting time.

Blitz other linebackers such as Akin rather than just Ware.

With this aggressive man to man defense we stick with the strength of the team and allow them to play their game instinctually. All in all, I think this style of defense that will fit this team and would give opposing teams fits. There won't be anymore easy Zimmer's zone defense to contend with anymore.

I'm not saying I know more about defense than Zimmer. But I know he ain't doing a good job. He is the defensive coordinator and needs to make this team into a championship defense. So far he has been nothing more than a disappointment.

Thats why I'm all for getting a new def. coordinator next year. Zimmer won't change this defense and we will waste another year of teams taking advantage of our weak zone defense.

We have talent on this team. He just doesn't know how to use them.

Hand-cuffed!!!

I have been preaching the same thing all season... and frankly, I'm getting tired of it. This coaching staff doesn't put this defense in position to succeed against good teams. They don't take advantage of the players skill-sets. They don't even gameplan to keep players away from situations where their weakness can be exposed. That just doesn't make sense.

You have guys at both safety positions that struggle in coverage... especially deep, yet you continually play a "cover 2" where your cover corners play a short zone and hand off deep routes to these guys? Does that make sense to anyone? You would think that the inconsistancy and lack of success with this scheme would make the coaching staff (Bill Parcells) rethink their philosophy on the defensive side of the ball. I am left scratching my head with this one. We have to be the only team in the NFL that runs a passive 3-4 defense. This is just one example of how a stubborn, micro-managing head coach is hand-cuffing his players and their potential.

Look at the season to this point. They have two wins... I repeat, two wins against good teams this season. That's it. The Giants and the Colts. The Colts game, as I have mentioned, was a completely different scheme defensively. It was the players who went to Zimmer... they begged Zimmer to let them open things up a bit. The gameplan was brilliant. The result was great. So why abandon that philosophy? Then there is the Giants game. A game against a team that was wounded and looked like they were ready to pack it in. This was a game that the Cowboys won in spite of the defensive gameplan. They were really lucky that Romo and Gramatica bailed them out in the end. It was real close to being decided by a coin-toss. So how good is this team?

This one is on the the coaching staff. They were outcoached in every aspect of the game. If the philosophy on defense is not trashed immediately, this team will lose the division and can expect nothing more than a first round exit.

- S

Too close for comfort

I thought that the Cowboys coaching staff had made a change for the better, and I thought that they had made a change for good. They made changes (defensively) against the Colts and Bucs that I thought that they would never make... I was glad that they made the changes, but shocked. They were creative and found different ways to pressure the QB and make them throw the ball before they wanted to. I was really looking forward to seeing this new defensive scheme against a team that heavily outplayed us in the first meeting this year. I thought things would be different this time around... I was wrong. I just don't get the philosophy of not getting pressure on the QB, while at the same time, letting wide-outs run free in the secondary. I thought that style of play was history after we saw the sucess of the previous two games? I just don't get it? Someone please make me understand. I don't blame the players near as much as I do the coaching staff in this one. That scheme has got to go.

I know that the primary objective was to stop Tiki Barber and limit his impact, but I don't agree with the approach. Eli Manning has been shown (in the past couple of weeks) to make stupid, game changing decisions when pressured... and you choose to let him get his confidence back by giving him all day throw the ball? Why change what you were doing before? Why not bring the same game that you brought to his brother, the same game that made the better of the two look flustered and make bad decisions? Again... I just don't get it?

Yes, we won the game. Yes, we took a commanding lead in the NFC East. But once again, we were that close to where one little mistake or one blown coverage could have cost us the division and COULD have put us in jeopardy of making the play-offs. I am happy that we got the win, but I am worried that we reverted to our old ways on defense.

• Romo came down to earth in this one, that's for sure. But when the pressure was on, he stood there and delivered. It was probably the best thing that could have happened for the long run.

• I guess getting rid of of Vander-jerk really paid off in this one. There is no way that he makes that kick in my opinion.

• Brady James and Keith Davis had absolutely horrible games. I counted multiple times that Davis took bad angles on plays that should have been stopped. They have got to be better.

• I agree with Mike... Barber is making a push to be the feature back. I like platooning the two guys, but at this point, Barber should be getting the bulk of the carries. He deserves it.

We got lucky this time... the Giants are a good team and we almost let them back into the race. Sorry to be so negative at a Cowboys win, but that was too close for me.

- S

8-4

• Romo on the pass to Witten? Wow. Just wow. Romo didn't have his greatest game, but under the spotlight with a ton of pressure, he came through. Just another sign that he may be the real deal.

• Barber looks to have taken over as the lead back. As much of a supporter of Julius' as I am, I'm beginning to think that Parcells has coached the playmaker right out of him. His rookie year, he looked for holes everywhere. Now, he never considers the cutback or running to daylight. He runs scared - not of opposing players, but of Parcells.

• T.O. His drops are getting very hard to take.

• Defense looked horrible. No pressure AT ALL. This same team made one Manning look horrible and the other look like a Hall of Famer - but not in the way most would think. Zero pressure. Here are a few players that didn't look so good:

— Bradie James had an awful game. Poor coverage, poor tackling. I know he's the "leader" of the defense, but today he didn't lead by example.

— Isn't Marcus Spears a first round pick?

— Wasn't Chris Canty supposed to be the steal of the draft?

• Won't bag on Roy this week. He was not a problem.

• Martin Grammatica was big on the last kick. Not sure Vanderjagt would have made that kick. In fact, pretty sure he would have pushed it right - again.

• Big, big win. To win a close division game like this was enormous.

• I really like Romo. It's good to be able to trust the QB again.

- M