quarterbacks for the Dallas Cowboys, who impressively
The combination of Tony Romo, Danny White, and Don Meredith in 2024 is Dak Prescott.
However, Prescott may be much more than just the most recent in a long series of Dallas Cowboys quarterbacks to win individual honors and games throughout the regular season before failing miserably in the postseason.
Nowitzki, Dirk.
Yes, but bear with me.
After another embarrassing postseason loss for the Cowboys, Prescott’s appalling performance has left long-distance supporters wondering what lies ahead for the quarterback. Will he still be the same great player who led the NFL in touchdown passes this year and has the potential to take the Cowboys to the Super Bowl in the future? Or will he always be associated with good but never great quarterbacks like Meredith (two NFL Championship Games, zero Super Bowls in the 1960s), White (three NFC Championship Games, zero Super Bowls in the 1980s), and Romo (four Pro Bowls, one Top 3 MVP, and zero Super Bowls in the 2000s) as merely a mediocre talent doomed to disappoint in the playoffs?
What happens if he is both? Prescott will rank in the top five NFL players in terms of value next week.
Player voting. But that award comes right after a miserable performance in which he threw two interceptions in the first half of a surprising upset loss to the Green Bay Packers in the first round of the playoffs, including a backbreaking Pick Six.
Prescott said, “I sucked.” It all comes down to winning in the postseason, something I haven’t accomplished yet.
In order to examine the Dak Dilemma, we must enlarge our view beyond even the 30,000 feet. Because it sounds eerily familiar to hear irrational, reflexive detractors dismiss him as a “loser,” a “choker,” and someone who is “mentally soft” who “will never take us to a championship.”
Breathe deeply and resist the urge to burn your No. 4 jersey. Take a broader view and go all the way back to 2007.
irrational frustration
Nearly 20 years ago, following a similarly humiliating playoff loss and at a point in his career that was nearly exactly identical to where Dak is now, we—that is, me—wrote off Dirk.
With averaging 25 points per game and leading the Dallas Mavericks to a league-best and franchise-record 67-15 record as well as the No. 1 seed throughout the playoffs, Nowitzki was named the 2007 NBA MVP.
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However, in one of the biggest upsets in NBA playoff history, the Mavs were humiliated by the No. 8-seeded Golden State Warriors in the opening round. Dirk missed 11 of 13 attempts and managed just 8 points in the decisive Game 6 in Oakland, where the Mavs were outscored by 25 points.
Bring on the unreasonable impatience.
In my series analysis for the Dallas Observer, I criticized Dirk for being “simply vanished,” calling him “intimidated,” and labeling him “a liability.”
I wrote, “He shit his shorts in the spotlight.” We believed he had grown up. We were in error.
Identify with these, Dak Denigrators
Dirk, then 28 years old, has participated in nine seasons of play. Prescott, thirty, recently completed his seventh. Like Dak, Dirk was a fantastic player on several very successful teams. Annual All-Star. recording scores. certain prizes. Everything, with the exception of attaching a ring.
After giving a poor performance, Dirk fled to Australia for a month, spending that time finding comfort in the bottle’s bottom and the middle of nowhere. He went hiking. He rested beneath the sky. He took a sip. He gave a guitar strum. He forced the question “Why me?” out of his body and thoughts. Each and every drop.
Then he came back, prepared.
At the beginning of the Mavs’ training camp four months later, Dirk stated, “There’s no guarantees for any team in any season.” “We’ll see what happens, but I’m determined to do everything in my power to put us in the best possible position come playoff time.”
“All I can do — all we can do — is try to come back stronger next season and take another swing at it in the playoffs,” said Prescott following his No. 2 seed team’s defeat two weeks prior by the seventh-seeded Packers. That is the strategy.
Similar to Nowitzki, Prescott is still a brilliant role model off the field, an impeccable leader in the locker room, and a terrific player who might win a championship for North Texas at some point in the future—perhaps even when we least expect it.