The Dallas Cowboys are 7-1, seem poised to run away with the NFC East, and are locked in with a quarterback/running back rookie duo who have fans excited about the future. So, what’s the issue? For the Cowboys and almost all of their fans, things are all wonderful right now.
But, for a few analysts, fans and members of the media from the outside, the attention as once again turned to wide receiver Dez Bryant. While Bryant is fully expected to be under a spotlight with the Cowboys, as he’s a player who wears his emotions on his sleeve, the conversation of Bryant being a distraction is growing old and honestly, a bit annoying at this point.
Did Bryant get agitated a bit during the Cowboys’ 35-10 dominant victory over the Cleveland Browns? Sure, but it wasn’t because he wasn’t getting the ball or was unhappy with the way the game was going. He got aggravated for potentially missed calls on plays that he could have turned into touchdowns and/or mistakes that were just being made.
For a 28-year-old wide receiver, who’s heard plenty of criticism, there should be no issue at all with him being a bit emotional. That especially stands true when he’s drawing double and even triple-teams on a pretty consistent basis at this point.
Bryant is going to have his monster games, and we saw him total 100-plus yards just one week before against the Philadelphia Eagles. He was also one of the heroes of that game, yet no one wanted to talk about that. Sunday against the Browns just wasn’t one of those monster games, and in turn, Bryant showing some emotion resulted in the good old “Cowboys have a Dez problem” argument, which is absurd.
Every player on every NFL team has their role, and it’s a role that’s going to change on a game-by-game basis. Whether Bryant is topping 100 yards with multiple scores in a single game, or he’s a decoy dealing with double teams, Bryant’s clear-cut role is the No. 1 wide receiver for quarterback Dak Prescott (or Tony Romo) and that’s not going to change anytime soon. More than anything, the issues stemming with Dez are being created by the media, and they have to be frustrated for all those involved.
Bryant has made it widely known that the most important thing to him is winning games. If the Cowboys were 1-7 or even 4-4 and he wasn’t getting the ball, then he’d have every right to be frustrated. For now, Bryant has no right to be frustrated, he’s not frustrated and the Cowboys are looking like one of the favorites to contend for a Super Bowl out of the NFC.
While there may be attempts to create problems in Dallas where there just aren’t problems, Bryant’s going to keep producing, or keep facing double teams, or doing whatever he’s asked to do. Unfortunately, the muttering of him being a distraction seems unlikely to every go away, unless he just winds up refusing to stop wearing his emotions on his sleeve, which we all know will never happen.
