Cassel knows drill: Go to Bryant, king of Cowboys’ receivers

This past July, Cowboys executive VP Stephen Jones actually agreed with the NFL’s reasoning, telling The Dallas Morning News, “Now, going forward is there a better way for some of these players like Dez Bryant, Calvin Johnson – is there a way to tweak a rule, you can say they should be catches under National Football League rules”. After beating the Washington Redskins, the Cowboys are only one game out of first in the NFC East, splitting the season with the Giants and Eagles and taking the first of two meetings with the Redskins.

At that point, Bryant was still out with a broken right foot, and even when he returned, practice time was limited.

“I don’t know that guys bring a lot of stuff with them from past games”, Cowboys coach Jason Garrett said. “A couple weeks ago, I asked several football personnel, including former GMs, current GMs, current individuals, former players, former officials, to come together and try to see if we can study this and come up with some proposals for the Competition Committee to consider. Tell them they need to call me, so I can have my input”, Bryant said. “I mean, when you go out there and you haven’t won a game yet and you finally get one, of course there’s a sense of relief”. They played that game with a visibly broken down offensive line that was missing Bryan Bulaga and TJ Lang while Corey Linsley and David Bahktiari picked up injuries during the game. It’s something we’re working on.

Then again, the Cowboys haven’t had a consistent practice plan.

Many of Bryant’s red-zone touchdowns with Romo at quarterback occurred on fades or back-shoulder throws, where hours of practice time made those plays seemingly routine. However, the first play was a sweep from Darren McFadden, who ran for nine yards and then went out of bounds and stopped the clock.

Dez Bryant’s catch during last year’s NFC Divisional Round match-up against the Green Bay Packers-the one that seemed like it was a catch, but apparently wasn’t-was largely responsible for bringing the issue regarding “what is a catch in the NFL” to the forefront.

“I think the further we move away from his surgery and everything”, Cassel said, “you get more opportunities out there on the practice field to continue to build that relationship”.