People make too much of the Cowboys record in the games Dak started last year. Unless they're incredibly biased, there's not a person out there who thinks Dalton is an equal or better option at QB than Dak.
Dak didn't play with a stout OL either. He was without both starting OTs in most of the games he played.
As for the defense.....the defense was garbage all year, but it was much worse the first 5 games of the season. They didn't start turning the corner until they finally decided to get rid of dead weight like Poe & Griffen around midseason. That's also about the time offense stopped turning the ball over as much and the defense finally started getting turnovers, which finally gave the offense some short fields to work with. Seemed like that hadn't happened in a couple of years.
Correct.
And the first four games were probably the toughest part of the schedule, with 3 of the 4 opponents making the playoffs.
The Rams were a playoff team and had one of the top defenses.
To beat the falcons they needed 40. To beat Seattle they would have needed 39. To beat the Browns the would have needed 50.
They were averagi 30 something points per game in the first 4 with Dak.
Meanwhile without Dak, they put up 10 in a loss to the Cardinals, 3 in a loss to Washington, 9 in a loss to the eagles, 19 in a loss to Pittsburgh, 16 in a second loss to Washington, 17 in a loss to the Ravens, and 19 in the final loss to the Giants.
This isn't a difficult puzzle to solve.
