The Aftermath.

My Top 5 deductions of last night's loss by the Burgundy & Gold to those dastardly Cow Town Cowards:

5. Special Teams - They did some great things. Cartwright's return, after the Barber TD, took all of the wind out of Dallas' sails. Suisham's 44-yarder to end the 1st half showed them that we could take their best punch. Plackemeier's punt to the 1 yd line (despite the wrong call on the field) was perfect. BUT... Cartwright's bobble out-of-bounds and Suisham's missed 46-yarder negated all of the good that they did. Overall Grade: C-.

4. Defensive Line - Obviously, when you give up 117 rushing yards, you're getting beat in the trenches. But, it was worse than that. The front four combined for three tackles. Three!!! And, Jason Taylor was invisible. Four-finger Tony was not sacked, not pressured, not hurried. The one good shot that the D put on him, the Rocky INT, was by a safety. If these guys don't get some penetration, teams have found the way to beat us over the last two weeks. Grade: F (Demetric Evans gets a C+).

3. The Secondary - Chris Horton was great, again. The TD that the Cowgirls did throw was at Horton, but he was in good position - the guy just made a career catch. Landry was slow getting over, also. Smoot made some Earth-shattering hits. McIntosh's INT was caused by Romo being hurried by a S blitz, and 'Los knocking the breath out of TO. Once again, w/o their best cover man, they blanketed TO, held Romo under 200 yds, and forced 2 INT's. BUT... D-Hall was beat on his INT, Four-Finger Tony badly threw behind TO - we got lucky. AND... it's still a ballgame if LaRon doesn't flat-out miss his tackle on Barber in the backfield on the final 4th & 1. My mantra is this: the D really misses Shawn Springs & Sean Taylor. Grade: C+ (Horton A, Los/Smoot/Hall C, Landry D).

2. Thieves - Casey Rabach, Shawn Alexander, & Jason Taylor are downright stealing money from Daniel Snyder. I know, this is a long-standing tradition, but it's got to stop. And Jon Jansen and Marcus Washington need to be put out to pasture. Otherwise the freshmen class and off-season acquisitions are on-target. If we were to spend this off-season addressing these 5 gaps - we'd have gone a long way. Cerrato's Grade (thus far): C+.

1. The Play - I knew that the game was over, and lost, when the following series of actions took place. The Skins had righted the ship, they were effectively running the Gibbs Coast Offense for the first time since the opening series, but found themselves sitting at 3rd & 7. Before Campbell could respond to Zorn's confusion, a penalty was thrown for the 'Skins having 12 men in the huddle. Dumb. So, they have the time it takes for the penalty to be called and the yardage to be assessed to get the proper play selected. Nope. JC has to take a timeout. Dumber. So, NBC cuts to commercial, and the 'Skins get an extended timeout to assemble the proper 3rd & 7 call. The result: Jay Ratliff dry humps Jason Campbell's head into the Kentucky bluegrass. F'ing ridiculous. Zorn's Playcalling Grade: D.

In the three games that Zorn has been on Prime Time television, the 'Skins are not only 0-3 - their offense looks completely dishevelled. I believe that the team is merely reflecting Zorn's nervousness, inexperience, and tenativity. As T.C. Williams High's Julius Campbell said, "Attitude reflect leadership, cap'n." ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGhz4OA6Wgg) Until Zorny finds his Comfort Zone under the lights, this team is second tier. Until they find an offense, they're not even that.