Five weeks into the season, Dallas Cowboys proprietor Jerry Jones has seen sufficient to ship a verdict on his workforce’s protection: nothing has modified.
“We are still, in my mind, right where we started relative to our defense,” Jones stated, in accordance with the Associated Press, after Thursday night time’s 24-16 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers — a defeat that dropped Dallas to 2-3 and got here in opposition to a winless workforce beginning an undrafted rookie quarterback in simply his second profession begin.
The admission carries vital weight. The Cowboys entered 2026 having remade the protection from prime to backside. They fired coordinator Matt Eberflus, performed 45 teaching interviews, employed 34-year-old Christian Parker as a first-time play-caller, and added veterans Rashan Gary, Jalen Thompson and Joey Porter Jr. via trades and free company.
The numbers bear Jones out. Dallas is the one NFL workforce with out an interception via 5 video games and the league’s worst dashing protection, surrendering 168.8 yards per recreation — the second-highest mark in franchise historical past, behind solely the 0-11-1 growth squad of 1960. The Cowboys have additionally turn into simply the second workforce in NFL historical past to permit every of their first 5 opponents to finish at the very least 70 % of their passes with out throwing a choose, becoming a member of the 2012 Oakland Raiders.
The failures sharpen an uncomfortable query for Dallas: how lengthy can an offense led by Dak Prescott, with CeeDee Lamb and George Pickens amongst his choices, carry a protection that, by Jones’s personal measure, has proven no enchancment in any way?
Dallas performs at Green Bay on Oct. 18.
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