This Sunday, the Cowboys square off against the Green Bay Packers, then they have a bye week, and then it’s time for the Philadelphia Eagles. Word is, Tony Romo plans to be ready to play against the Iggles. Will he still have his starting job, or has rookie Dak Prescott (pictured above right, performing the Vince Staples verse on ScHoolboy Q’s “Ride Out”) taken over? Yes. I mean, no. I mean, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.
The only thing that’s clear is this: if the Cowboys beat the Packers, on the road, and Dak looks good in the game, oh my lord, the two weeks between that one and the next game are going to be [types so many flame emojis I pass out from the pain; a doctor recommends surgery; I struggle through eight months of intense rehab; I start typing flame emojis again].
People will debate, and re-debate, and then debate whether anyone should debate or re-debate, and then debate that. My body is ready. I want to roll up my sleeves and build a cabin — it’s imperfect, yes, but maybe that makes it perfect? — amid the chaos.
But that also sort of misses the point. What should the Cowboys actually do in that situation?
- Keep playing Dak. It would be somewhat divisive among the fanbase and maybe in the locker room, but probably less so there. A lot of those guys have never played with Romo, or haven’t played much, and only one of them went to see Coldplay with him (Jason Witten, and I swear they were sharing a beer — yes, I was at the same Coldplay show). This falls under “ride the hot hand” or “don’t fix it if it ain’t broken” or any number of cliches. Probably half of them. But it makes sense, and if I had a say (I don’t anymore), I would vote for this.
- Start Romo. It’s unfair to lose your job due to injury. And the last time Romo played on a regular basis [hits left arrow on iCal; hits again; hits again; hits again; hits again; hits again; hits again; hits again; hits again; hits again; hits again; hits again; hits again; hits again; hits again; hits again; again; again; again; again; again; again; again; aga — ah, OK here we go] he was pretty dang good. I mean, it was a pretty long time ago — back then, people didn’t immediately roll their eyes when you said “Zooey Deschanel” — but still.
- Lock Romo and Dak in a room and make them figure it out on their own. Classic bottle episode.
- Cut them both, start Mark Sanchez. It’s a radical solution. But I would argue it has its merits. It’s something I’ve learned from moving a lot. You could get a box, pack everything up nice and neat, write “Kitchen” on the side in Sharpie, and take the box to your new place. Or: stack it all, or at least most of it, haphazardly by the curb and just start over. It’s easy and it feels good until, like, three months down the line and you wonder why you have to buy a potato masher again, I mean, those things should last forever, oh, right I tossed it. OK, maybe don’t do this.
- Tell Romo he’s starting and then play a fake game and stage it that he does so well — whoa he juked Fletcher Cox out of his shoes; still got it, Tony! — he’s able to come to terms with his numerous injuries and get a measure of closure before ultimately handing the reins to Dak. I can’t go too much into this due to various nondisclosure agreements and so on, but it would essentially function like a football version of the 1997 Michael Douglas vehicle The Game but with less suicide and weirdly more Sean Penn. Related side note: you know what is super underrated? The 1997 Michael Douglas vehicle The Game.
- Don’t make any firm decisions and send out weird signals — give one of them a couple of series in the middle of a game or run a trick play with both on the field, stuff like that — to ensure the chaos continues unabated, swallowing whole what looked to be a promising season and then letting the controversy fester throughout the offseason, with Jerry Jones and Jason Garrett contradicting each other on a regular basis.
