The Dallas Cowboys are now 3-2 after suffering their second consecutive loss on Sunday afternoon to the Green Bay Packers. The final score of 34-24 does not tell the story of this game as this was a beat down. The Cowboys were down 31-3 until late in the third quarter.

Quick Notes

The Cowboys are optimistic about Tyron Smith and La’el Collins playing Sunday against the New York Jets. Smith is more likely to play than Collins at this point in the week although both did not practice when the team returned to practice on Wednesday.

Leighton Vander Esch did not practice Wednesday due to an illness. Antwaun Woods practiced on a limited basis after returning to practice last Friday and it is expected to return to game action on Sunday.

Going back to the midway point of the 2018 season, the Cowboys have lost six games and all six opponents have rushed for over 100 yards.

Stock Up

Michael Gallup

After missing the last two games due to knee surgery, Gallup returned to action Sunday with 7 catches for 113 yards and one touchdown. Gallups 113 yards per game leads all NFL receivers. His total numbers in three games: 20 catches, 339 yards, one TD. 17 yards per catch.

Brandon Knight

Brandon Knight was forced into action Sunday after La’el left the game due to injury and played 28 snaps in Sunday’s loss. The reason I put Brandon Knight in this week’s stock up report is that coming into a game in the middle of the game is not an easy thing to do. When he came into the game, the Cowboys were down big, the Packers pass rush had been consistently getting to Dak and he only practiced with the first team one day last week after the majority of his work came on the scout team and he was still able to hold his own and allow the Cowboys to continue fighting their way back into the game.

Stock Down

The Entire defense

The run defense was by far the number one problem for the defense in this game. Aaron Jones came into the game averaging 3.3 yards per carry and in Sunday’s game he ran for 107 yards on 19 carries (5.6 ypc) and added 75 receiving yards on seven receptions. It is not often you can say this about an NFL defense but I truly do not think you can point at anyone on the defensive side of the ball and say “player X” played well. Players struggled on all levels of the defense, the defensive line, the linebackers and the secondary all played poorly. The Cowboys defense thrives off being able to fill the gaps on defense and when the defensive line fails to fill the correct gaps, it puts a lot of pressure on the linebackers, who in this game did not play well. Vander Esch had the worst game of his young career. There were numerous times where the corners failed to seal the edge and allowed Jones to run around them, including on Jones’ third touchdown run when he waved at Byron Jones.

Dak Prescott

Dak Prescott threw for a career-high 463 yards Sunday against Green Bay. Those yards came with three interceptions and Dak could have thrown 2 or 3 more if it wasn’t for Packers penalties or defensive players flat out dropping the ball. There has been a lot of debate on whose fault the interceptions fall on so I am going to give my opinion on them.

First interception – I am blaming both Amari Cooper and Dak on this one. Yes, Cooper should have caught the ball but at the same time, Cooper scores if Dak throws a ball that leads him and is not behind him. Ball placement continues to be an issue for Dak and the more he is forced to throw the ball, the more that becomes an issue.

Second interception – This interception is all on Prescott. He didn’t see Chandon Sullivan underneath in coverage and tried to fit the ball into Cobb as his check-down Ezekiel Elliott was open.

Third interception – I don’t like to be the guy that blames the refs but this was 90% on the refs and 10% on Dak. Gallup was mauled by the defender, which didn’t allow Gallup to get to his spot. I put 10% on Dak because after the game he said he threw the ball because he was anticipating a flag being thrown.