What more is there to say? There aren’t enough adjectives that can accurately describe the Dallas Cowboys’ abysmal performance against the Detroit Lions. Sure, they’re still a .500 team heading into the bye, but they played like a winless bunch with no solutions to their problems in sight. As the Lions dominated the Cowboys at AT&T Stadium for their third home loss this season, the “home crowd” serenaded the Cowboys on the field. It didn’t take long for the Lions crowd to take over the stadium, and chants for Jared Goff and Detroit took over the building. As a Cowboys fan, the range of emotions reflected the five stages of grief throughout the game.

Disclaimer: “There’s no way this team is that incompetent offensively.”

Anger: “ANOTHER INTERCEPTION?”

Negotiation: “If they can get healthy on defense, maybe they can get more stops.”

Depression: “As long as Jerry makes money, nothing will change.”

Acceptance: “We’ll see what happens against the Niners.”

It will be a long two weeks before the team gets another chance to redeem themselves and put this poor performance behind them. However, after this match, there must be a critical examination of why this team has not only underperformed at home, but also against good teams. Bye there will be plenty of time to explore what needs to change, but for now let’s look at how the coaching affected this embarrassing loss and what went wrong for the Cowboys in their 47-9 loss.

On minor points it may be insignificant to some, but it is incomprehensible why a head coach still chooses not to defer after winning the coin toss to start the game. This means that no matter how bad the match goes, your team can get the ball and start the second half with a glimmer of hope, especially considering that onside kicks are not allowed until the fourth quarter and as a team is behind. The Cowboys once again opted to take the ball to start the game, and all they could muster was a field goal after a good drive. Detroit saw Dallas stagnate and capitalized on points with a touchdown on their opening drive. This has developed into a pattern in recent weeks. No matter what bravado Mike McCarthy tries to instill in the team, it’s a nonsensical decision to begin with, but it’s made worse by an offense that can’t finish drives in the red zone. McCarthy should know his team better than this, but that’s only minor. What else stands out about the coaching from Sunday’s game?

According to Mina Kimes, Dak Prescott had the highest percentage of tight windows in 2022. Fast forward to this season, and it’s been a theme all season that the Cowboys’ offense is littered with tight throws that force Prescott to put the ball in high-risk spots . situations. Some of that can be attributed to the need for more talent at wide receivers. Still, the coaches can do more to alleviate that for Prescott. For a direct model in juxtaposition, consider Detroit.

Watching the Lions offense work with creativity, pre-snap movement and isolating receivers in mismatches only increases the Cowboys’ need for easier situations to move the ball. At one point, Amon-Ra St. Brown had to be covered by linebacker DeMarvion Overshown after Detroit cleared their receivers, giving St. Brown a clear path down the field. Dallas needs to incorporate more deception or even make plays to get the players open. Since they don’t do this anywhere as often as they should, the Cowboys are forced to play methodically and nearly perfectly on every down to avoid a third-and-long.

Meanwhile, Detroit unveiled the playbook that almost seemed like a personal vendetta for the Cowboys’ controversial win over them last season. The Lions showed their offensive linemen on two of their three trick plays despite having a significant lead over the Cowboys. In short, the Lions had more fun than the Cowboys, and it showed thanks to their play-caller/play-designer lightening the load on their respective star quarterback and receiver versus Dallas pushing everything on Prescott and CeeDee Lamb and expecting them to fly the team from an early downward spiral. The same allegations that head coach Mike McCarthy was under fire for in Green Bay are now starting to emerge in Dallas. You know the ones: stale, unimaginative, boring. You can use the exact synonyms to describe the Cowboys broken offense. If you now want to emphasize that the violation entails personnel problems, we agree with that.

What is incomprehensible, however, is that Ezekiel Elliott is being used as much as he was after Rico Dowdle’s game against the Pittsburgh Steelers last week. Elliott admitted to reporters his frustration over his lack of participation in the offense. Still, it didn’t help that he was given a prominent role in the game’s second series. Elliott carried the ball four times for six yards (1.5 yards per attempt) on that drive. His final attempt on that drive went for one yard and put Dallas on second-and-long, where they threw an interception in the red zone two plays later. The offense doesn’t have many playmakers, but giving meaning to a player, a shell of his former self, falls on the coaches as well as the player. For the season, Elliott has 30 carries for just 98 yards. The offense needs to find a way to put the ball in the hands of its best players in more diverse ways and keep their better players on the field in the first place.