FRISCO, Texas — It was a hot start for the Dallas Cowboys at the outset of September football, seeing as they marched into Cleveland and handed the Browns a loss to begin the 2024 season, but the two contests that followed were quite unattractive — dropping two in a row at AT&T Stadium before righting the ship with a much-needed win over the New York Giants to move to a 2-2 record.
The calendar now turns to the month of October, where head coach Mike McCarthy expects much cleaner football in Week 5 and beyond.
"I hope we learned from [September], because we need to be better," he said. "I'm talking more in the area of fundamentals and technique, and so forth, but I think you are who you are after four games."
This is all made more difficult by the injury status of Micah Parsons and DeMarcus Lawrence, as more of the youth will be asked to play more and evolve more quickly.
One of the biggest issues that has hamstrung the Cowboys' offense, and defense as well, at times, are penalties. It's the offense suffering the most, however, seeing several of their lengthy drives end with drive-killing calls (e.g., holding) that have only exacerbated the inconsistencies in finding the end zone.
In all, the Cowboys were penalized 11 times for a total of 89 yards against the Giants, while Big Blue were penalized only four times for a total of 35 yards. Against the Ravens, the Cowboys were penalized an eye-popping 13 times for 105 combined yards, while Baltimore logged only six flags for 44 combined yards.
Keep in mind, these are not all of the penalties, but rather only the ones that weren't declined.
"We've done a lot of analytical dives and spent a lot of time on situational," said McCarthy. "We've had a lot of balanced games in our first four [games], but I think the thing that stands out is the critical penalties in situations. That's some we really need to do a better job of. We're always gonna be working on our fundamentals and things like that, and wanna be better in more areas than others.
"That's always part of the normal progression of an NFL season. … We've gotta be better in the penalty areas."
And, again, it's not simply the amount of penalties.
It's also the type and timing.
"We've way too many third-down penalties, way too many red zone penalties and a couple of two-minute penalties," McCarthy explained. "That affects scoring, it affects the opportunity for the offense to have the ball more and it affects the defense being on the field longer."
It's something that, along with continued improvement in the areas of execution and technique, the Cowboys will need to hammer home and nail down to avoid a similarly even, or worse, month of October.
Considering the gauntlet they have before them, the sooner the better.
