JUST CHILL: Cowboys grades vs. the Patriots
RUSH OFFENSE: C—The Cowboys rushed 24 times for 100 yards, but it was fools gold. Quarterback Brandon Weeden had three carries for 18 yards. Joseph Randle had 60 yards on 15 carries, but the Cowboys didn’t run consistently well enough to impact the game. Darren McFadden had five carries for 16 yards. Nothing to write home about. The Cowboys miss DeMarco Murray right now. He made plays and got yards against eight-man fronts. The Cowboys are simply running into a wall.
PASS OFFENSE: F — Brandon Weeden had his worst game in place of Tony Romo as the starter and could get benched for the New York Giants game after the bye. Weeden missed open receivers all over the field. He threw late. He threw high. He checked down too much. He was failed by three dropped passes and receivers unable to get open. It was ugly.
RUN DEFENSE: D—The Cowboys got run over late by the Patriots. LeGarrette Blount had 13 carries for 74 yards and Dion Lewis had six carries for 34 yards. Both averaged 5.7 yards per carry. The Cowboys continue to miss too many tackles. Middle linebacker Rolando McClain led the Cowboys with eight tackles in his first game of the season after missing the first four under NFL suspension.
PASS DEFENSE: C— The Cowboys did a good job early with their 3-2-6 defense that confused the Patriots. Tom Brady had been sacked six times in the first three games and was sacked five times in the first half. Brady adjusted and made plays in the second half. He ended up 20 of 27 for 275 yards with two touchdowns. The Cowboys missed too many tackles in the secondary and the Patriots benefited from a pick play. It wasn’t as smoothly as the numbers indicate. End Greg Hardy and the Cowboys defense made Brady sweat.
SPECIAL TEAMS: C— Chris Jones did a nice job angling his punts. He averaged 41 yards on six punts. But the coverage was lacking. Danny Amendola averaged 13 yards a return and had a long of 25. Lucky Whitehead had no impact on kickoff or punt returns. Cole Beasley remains a punt catcher.
COACHING: D—Credit Rod Marinelli for going outside the box and coming up with the 3-2-6 defensive scheme that caught the Patriots off guard and had Tom Brady flummoxed for a bit. In the end, it wasn’t good enough on either side of the ball. Coach Jason Garrett has lost three consecutive games for the first time since he took over the job midway through the 2010 season.
This story was originally published October 13, 2015 at 1:50 PM with the headline "JUST CHILL: Cowboys grades vs. the Patriots."