Tashard Choice proved two things against the Colts on Sunday afternoon.
He proved that the team would have been better off using his speed, elusivness and grit as a running back this season than they were relying on the fairly useless Marion Barber. His 100 yards on 19 carries were impressive as was the way the Cowboys rode Choice and Felix Jones on the masterful 18-play drive that put them back in the lead late in the fourth quarter. It showed that Choice has all the tools one needs to be a feature back in this league.
He also proved that Jerry Jones should stop giving interviews for a while.
Last week Jones said that the reason Choice wasn't getting carries on offense was because he didn't contribute enough on special teams. That's akin to saying that a presidential candidate is unfit for service because they weren't a good ice cream salesman one summer during high school. Alas, Choice's big day isn't doing anything to stop Double J from making a fool of himself with his commentary on the team.
"He’s about to earn himself a spot where he doesn’t have to make up for his special-teams shortcomings," Jones said. "The third back has to be a special whiz. But if you are the second back, you don’t necessarily need to be a whiz on special teams."
Again, it's a strawman argument employed by a guy who doesn't seem to understand that it makes no sense that Choice was on the team at all if he wasn't helping on special teams. He filled a uniform, wore a helmet and sat unused for nonsensical reasons that didn't change one bit on Sunday.
When the book on this Cowboys season is rewritten, especially if they keep furiously rewriting it with weekly victories, the lead chapter is going to have to be the way that Jones's failings as a personnel evaluator stopped this team from reaching its potential. Whether it was the failure to understand the problems with the offensive line, the inability to detect Sean Lee's ability or the shackling of Choice to the bench, Jones has been wrong on every decision that didn't involve drafting Dez Bryant.
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When Wade Phillips was the coach, Jones' favorites got all the playing time even if it came at the expense of the rest of the team. We'll find out over the last four weeks if Jason Garrett is also more concerned with kissing up to the boss than winning football games.
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