This week’s edition of Cowboys Executives Say The Darnedest Things has an extended version.
Apart from owner Jerry Jones commenting (again) on the betting line for his team’s game, Jones has linked quarterback Tony Romo’s reduction in turnovers to his involvement in game planning.
“Romo’s additional involvement, and I’m talking about in the actual preparation of the game plan -- his early-week work -- a part of that should have, and has, brought along a more sensitivity about protecting the ball and about the bad play,” Jones said during a weekly segment with 105.3 The Fan in Dallas on Friday, via Carlos Mendez of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. “And I think you’re seeing that at work.”
Jones thinks that Romo now has an even greater incentive to avoid turnovers and “the bad play.”
“One of the things that you get when you put more, you invest -- we hear that word, ‘take ownership’ – one of the things you do is you sometimes, some of the creative aspects of it, some of the risk-taking aspect, it’s more compromised because you’ve also taken ownership of the downside of taking some of these risks,” Jones said.
But it’s likely a little too early to draw broad conclusions. Through three games, Romo has thrown one interception and fumbled twice (one was lost).
That’s hardly mistake-free football. But it’s a lot better than Week Four of last year, when he had five interceptions against the Bears. Or Week Eight, when he had four against the Giants. Or Week 17, when he had three against Washington in a playoff play-in game.
Did he care any less last year because he wasn’t involved in the early-week game planning? Either way, he’s the one on the big stage who is screwing up for the world to see. That should be ownership enough.
The more accurate explanation possibly is that, by having Romo involved in game planning, the strategies devised better fit with his comfort zone.
Either way, let’s see how the rest of the reason goes before declaring that the Cowboys finally have figured out the formula for transforming a guy with one playoff win in his career into a candidate for Canton.