JT the Brick

Welcome to the insanity that is the Dallas Cowboys' bye week. Since the inception of the bye week in 1990, no team has looked more forward to a week off than the 2008 Cowboys. It's not that they deserve a vacation, but this team needs to step back and reassess things before facing the Washington Redskins in Week 11.

Before the regular season, I picked Dallas to reach the Super Bowl. What was I thinking?

The Cowboys (5-4) are in last place in the NFC East and trail the division-leading New York Giants by three games in the loss column. All four losses have come to NFC teams, and Dallas is the only team in their division that has given up more than 200 points (219). I, along with many so-called NFL insiders, believed these Cowboys were poised to make a run at a championship because they returned 13 Pro Bowl players from last season, and they appeared focused on a Super Bowl title.

I thought signing Adam "Pacman" Jones would bolster the secondary and return team. I bought into the notion that first-round pick Felix Jones would enhance the ground attack and make the Cowboys offense more balanced.

After watching the preseason HBO series, "Hard Knocks," I got sucked into the belief that America's Team was back. Hollywood celebrities turned out to watch practice. The Cowboys seemed loose as they played practical jokes on one another, and Terrell Owens and Tony Romo laughed as cameras followed their every move.

After an impressive 3-0 start, the Cowboys looked like the best team in the NFL. I thought they were on pace for 13 wins and home-field advantage for the NFC playoffs. But after a 26-24 loss to the Redskins, they began to lose confidence. A closer-than-expected home win over the Bengals showed that the Cowboys were playing below-average defense, and things didn't look right.

"Pacman" Jones' scuffle with a private security guard and his subsequent four-game suspension and entrance into alcohol rehab created more distractions for the Cowboys, who then fell to the Arizona Cardinals and lost quarterback Tony Romo to a broken finger.

This is when the wheels officially came off the bandwagon and Dallas went into the tank. Not only did the Cowboys lose to a team that they thought they were better than, but they also lost their leader on offense. The offensive line was exposed for being slow and out of rhythm as Marion Barber only rushed for 45 yards.

During that week, I started taking many calls from concerned Cowboys fans. Romo served as more of a distraction when he said he'd try to play despite his broken finger — he tried to practice and was activated as the backup quarterback against the St. Louis Rams, but he never played and Dallas flopped.

Brad Johnson has been the starting quarterback since that loss, and he has played like an aging veteran who knows he is in over his head. Why was Romo prepared to play against the Rams, only to stand on the sidelines and watch his team get embarrassed? Why did he announce he would not play the next week, when that announcement should have come from coach Wade Phillips?

Quarterbacks have played with worse injuries than Romo's. Do you think Troy Aikman, Joe Montana, Terry Bradshaw or Otto Graham would have missed a significant amount of time nursing a broken pinkie as their team was imploding around them?

Since then, Cowboys fans have gone silent — they clearly have no confidence in their team. Even after Dallas beat a good Tampa team, you could hear a pin drop when I called out the proud fans of America's Team to break down the Cowboys' chances of beating the Giants.

I've never seen Cowboys fans so lost and timid when it came to their team. Romo is supposed to be the leader of the team, but the last time he had the chance to get away for a week during the season, he split with his girlfriend Jessica Simpson and her parents to Cabo San Lucas when he should have been breaking down film for the start of the playoffs. Terrell Owens never has been a leader — he only points fingers at teammates when the going gets tough or sulks on the sidelines. The only current Cowboy playing at a Pro Bowl level is pass rushing specialist DeMarcus Ware, who never takes a play off.

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The Cowboys' season still can be salvaged. They return to the field Nov. 16 at Washington, and if they can win that, they should handle the 49ers and Seahawks to finish November 8-4. But after that, they play at Pittsburgh, home against the Giants and Ravens, then end Dec. 28 at Philadelphia.

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The final game of the regular season against Philly will be the game that decides if Dallas makes the playoffs. I just hope that Cowboys fans have more confidence heading into that game than they do now.