Bell: Dez Bryant drama can wait until he heals
There’s always another layer when it comes to Dez Bryant and the Dallas Cowboys.
It’s the drama factor.
The star receiver suffered a hairline fracture to his right knee Sunday night, but beyond the typical diagnosis, treatment and recovery, this development included the unusual twist of the high-maintenance Bryant refusing to show up on time Tuesday to get an MRI.
Then came a team fine, a heart-to-heart talk with the coach, more football-is-bigger-in-Texas talk-show fodder and oh, the actual MRI.
All of that to get to this: Bryant is officially listed as questionable for the Cowboys game at San Francisco on Sunday, but reportedly expected to miss three weeks.
Turns out that an emotional Bryant — whose season was severely disrupted last season by a foot injury — didn’t want to face the prospect of bad news that the originally scheduled MRI might bear.
If so, what a fragile psyche.
Beyond that, however, Bryant — a fabulous player with grit, passion and the skillful knack of consistently winning jump balls against defenders — needs to heed a lesson from dealing with his fractured foot last season. He gamely did everything possible in 2015, including therapeutic injections of bone marrow stem cell transferred to his foot, to rush back. Yet when he returned, his game still lacked the usual timing, flow and punch. More time off probably would have helped.
Sure, injuries are part of the game and playing through pain is part of the deal. Yet the temptation of rushing back — with the back injury that has just wiped out Houston Texans star defensive end J.J. Watt’s season as Exhibit A — makes it such a fine line.
Playing on a hairline fracture increases the risk of developing a larger crack, some experts contend.
It’s no wonder that in talking to reporters in Texas on Friday, Bryant seemed to have had a reality check. He expressed the need to “play it smart” while realizing it’s a long season.
Yes, the drama can wait.
Other items of interest as Week 4 in the NFL rolls on…
Who’s hot: LeGarrette Blount. What a perfect time for the Patriots to roll with the NFL’s leading rusher. Tom Brady’s suspended. Backup quarterbacks Jimmy Garappolo and Jacoby Brissett nurse injuries. The O-line is battered. All-world tight end Rob Gronkowski, dealing with a hamstring issue, still doesn’t have a catch. With the Bills coming on Sunday, Blount’s impact (298 yards, 4.0-yard average, 4 TDs) has been so essential to New England’s chance to sweep the four games without Brady. He’s the first Patriot to log 20-plus carries in three consecutive games since Corey Dillon in 2004, the first to put up back-to-back 100-yard games since Stevan Ridley, roughly four years ago. Also special: The past two games, Blount has been an even bigger force in the second halves, running 94 yards against Houston and 92 yards vs. Miami after halftime. Kind of like the Blount force object to finish off tired defenses.
Pressure’s on: Brock Osweiler. With franchise player J.J. Watt done for the year with a back injury, the new Texans quarterback insists that Watt’s absence doesn’t add extra pressure. In one sense, he’s correct. Osweiler and his offense would be trying to score on every possession, whether Watt was in uniform or not. In reality, though, there’s a ripple effect. You don’t lose the best defensive player in the NFL without it making a difference. In their two victories, Houston’s defense — with Watt at less than himself — allowed 14 and 12 points. If the Texans defense, sans Watt, allows a few more points per game, the chances of winning increase with that much more offensive production. So while Osweiler doesn’t want to acknowledge that while carrying a $72 million contract, it’s basically called complementary football. Then there’s the production that Osweiler needs to improve upon as he gets going in Bill O’Brien’s offense. He’s completed just 59.6% of his passes, has thrown more picks than TDs (4-3) and is the 24th-ranked passer in the NFL (72.2). In other words, even if Watt were healthy and able, the heat would still be on Osweiler to do better for a franchise that paid him to be the big link that helps to get it over the hump as a legit playoff contender.
Key matchup: Matt Ryan vs. Luke Kuechly, Thomas Davis, et al. The Falcons quarterback leads the NFL in passer rating (119.0), with a gaudy 7-1 TD-to-INT ratio. But Ryan’s most recent outing came against such a depleted defense. I mean, is there any defense worse than the New Orleans unit? Well, statistically speaking, that would be Oakland, which Ryan faced the previous week and ranks 32nd for yards allowed, one notch below the Saints ranking. A stiffer test comes Sunday at the Georgia Dome when the defending NFC champs bring the league’s third-ranked defense. Kuechly and Davis, the star linebackers, can cover or blitz while aligned with a dominant D-line. But they’re human, too. The last time Carolina played in Cam Newton’s hometown, Kuechly was torched on Ryan’s big pass to Julio Jones, the highlight of a game that doused the Panthers’ dream for a perfect season.
Rookie watch: Michael Thomas. Drew Brees triggers the NFL’s most productive passing game again, but the No. 1 ranking is half-empty. The Saints are 0-3 for the second year in a row and third time in five seasons. But the emergence of Thomas, a second-round pick with size, hands, ball skills and football IQ, has seemingly answered the question of whether New Orleans would replace the security blanket that Marques Colston was for Brees for so many years. Thomas, who leads the Saints with 17 catches, is the No. 3 receiver working out of the slot and the big red zone target (6-3, 203) that Brees surely will want to show off on Sunday when he returns to San Diego to face his former team.
Next man up: Quinton Dunbar. With Washington cornerback Bashaud Breeland sidelined by a high ankle sprain and slot corner Dashaun Phillips out with a hamstring injury, that means more snaps for Dunbar, a second-year pro, in some form or fashion. It’s likely that Greg Toler and Kendall Fuller will start at corner and slot against Cleveland, but Dunbar — who converted to corner this season after playing receiver last season — is an intriguing player to watch. He made the spectacular end zone interception against Eli Manning during the win against the Giants on Sunday that ignited Odell Beckham, Jr.’s sideline blowup — one in a series of pivotal plays that Dunbar was involved in. He also caught a 31-yard pass from punter Tress Way on a faked punt and before that, muffed a punt that set up a NY TD. So the chance to see more of Dunbar offers the potential for more drama, one way or another.
Stomach for an upset? Cleveland at Washington. At one time, this contest loomed as Robert Griffin III’s opportunity for revenge against the team that kicked him to the curb. Then RG3’s season was derailed by a fractured shoulder. A week ago, the matchup seemed destined to be one that pitted two winless teams. Then Washington upset the Giants. Now it’s a try, try-again scenario for the Browns, who nearly pulled off their first victory under new coach Hue Jackson last Sunday at Miami. After rallying from an 11-point fourth-quarter deficit, the Browns forced a fumble that set up a chance for a game-winning field goal…only for Cody Parkey to miss a 48-yard kick, and the Browns to lose in overtime. That’s so Cleveland. In Week 2, the Browns blew a 20-point lead against Baltimore, with momentum swinging on a blocked extra point. So Cleveland. If the Browns pull off a stunner at FedEx Field, there’s a good chance that the fingerprints of Terrelle Pryor — providing a bright spot as a slash factor — will be all over it.
Did you notice? Matthew Stafford is doing as well as can be expected for a quarterback who can no longer throw to Megatron, retired Lions receiver Calvin Johnson. He’s found a rhythm with newcomer Marvin Jones, the NFL’s receiving leader (18 catches, 408 yards), and entered Week 4 with the third-most passing yards in the NFL. Stafford (7 TDs, 2 INTs) has been spraying the ball to no shortage of weapons, including Anquan Boldin, Golden Tate and dynamic running back Theo Riddick. It’s early, but if the 105.0 passer rating he’s had through three games holds up for the season, it would mark the most efficient campaign of Stafford’s career.
Whatever happened to… Khalil Mack. After ranking second in the NFL with 15 sacks last season and validating his status as a legit star by earning first-team all-pro selections at two positions — defensive end and outside linebacker — the Raiders standout defender has yet to post a sack. Raiders coach Jack Del Rio insists he isn’t concerned and likened Mack’s impact as similar to Los Angeles Rams D-tackle Aaron Donald’s excellence this season despite not producing a sack. But the Raiders head into Sunday’s game at Baltimore with the worst-ranked defense in the NFL. When that’s matched by the fact that the best player is sackless, maybe somebody should be concerned.
Stat’s the fact: Trevor Siemian ranks in the 20s among NFL quarterbacks for key markers such as passing yards, completions and interception rate, but come the fourth quarter? Much better guy. The Broncos young quarterback is — by far — the NFL’s most efficient passer in the fourth quarter, when he’s completed 70% of his passes (3 TDs, 0 INTs) and produced a passer rating of 146.9. This is more impressive when considering the tight games Denver (3-0) has had each week. The Broncos trailed in the fourth quarter against the Panthers and Bengals, and were tied midway through the third quarter against the Colts. With a defense that can (and has) come up big in crunch time, fourth-quarter magic — and efficiency — is proving to be a reliable formula for winning in the Mile High City.
PHOTOS: WEEK 4 POWER RANKINGS
