SANTA CLARA, Calif. — There’s nothing on the Dallas Cowboys who is silent or stealthy, and on a Sunday night, when the American team almost sneaked up and stole a match from the San Francisco 49ershis time at Levi’s Stadium began and ended with a bang.

This time, Jerry Jones – so often the source of noise surrounding his franchise – was a casualty. After approaching the scene in the first of a group of three SUVs and passing a security check, the 82-year-old owner and his wife, Gene, were startled by a loud noise: a suddenly deployed rising barricade had hit the vehicle behind them, injuring their daughter, Charlotte, and their son, Jerry Jr.

“It’s a (device) meant to stop a car,” a still-shaken Jones told me on the sidelines before the game. “Well, let me tell you something: works.”

Hours later, after a furious fourth-quarter rally failed and the Cowboys fell 30-24, cornerback Trevon Diggs emerged from the visitors’ locker room, which was not yet open to the media, to confront a Dallas television reporter about a third-quarter social media post that questioned the player’s effort on a 43-yard catch and run by the 49ers. END George Kittle. As Diggs walked away, the reporter suggested they discuss the matter further.

“Talk about fucking nuts“, Diggs retorted.who did not make himself available for interviews.

Hey, with these Cowboys, everything’s great, except when it’s not.

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Other than that, it was a completely uneventful evening for a team awash in drama and deflated expectations, and trending poorly on both counts. Throw the kicker Brandon Aubrey‘s continued stint as a juror in a felony trial and the growing sense that Mike McCarthy is a lame coach with a near-impossible mission and a quarterback Dak PrescottThe two interceptions in front of tens of millions of viewers seem almost incidental in comparison.

Seven games into a season, Jones sported a “while“Sense of urgency, his team seems out of answers. Dallas is 3-4, but given the Cowboys, that looks like 3-400.

“We are the most visible team in sports,” veteran running back said Ezekiel Elliott then said. “That’s all part of it. We just have to block it.

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It won’t be easy. Jones, in recent weeks, has caused a stir by making a Diggs-style decision and threatens to fire local radio hosts whose show he appears on twice a week. After overcoming this argument, sparked by questions the owner didn’t like, he attempted to explain the Cowboys’ offensive woes by claiming that McCarthy and his assistants are “we design bad games, or we design bad concepts.”

McCarthy, who coached the Green Bay Packers to a victory in Super Bowl XLV in the stadium Jones owns, went 12-5 in each of his three regular seasons as Dallas’ coach, but getting there in 2024 will be extremely difficult. That’s impractical, given that McCarthy is in the final year of his contract – and his squad has obvious weaknesses.

The Cowboys have the worst rushing attack in the league and, with the Carolina Panthersallow more rushing yards per game than any other team. This is a nasty double that’s tough to overcome, and when you add in a spin rate of minus eight, the NFLThe third worst figure of 2017: a rapid recovery is difficult to imagine.

“We’re green,” McCarthy told me as he headed toward the team bus long after Sunday’s game. “We have a lot of young people and they have to continue to work. And we have a lot of veterans who are new, so they’re adjusting too. Our continuity isn’t there, and that’s going to show up in the run defense and running the ball.

“Because of all this, we can’t play wide open and hit the wall. We need to address those two areas – run management and stopping, and turnover rate – and try to find a way to perfect the plays.

Even after Jordan Mason left the game, the Cowboys defense was no match for 49ers rookie Isaac Guerendo. (Kelley L Cox / Imagn Images)

That’s basically what happened in the first half of Sunday’s game against the 49ers (4-4), another top team with its own experience. mid-season malaise. Dallas took a 10-6 lead after the locker room and, despite the absence of injured pass threats (Micah Parsons And DeMarcus Lawrence), seemed capable of controlling the Niners’ offense.

Then the third quarter started and the Cowboys were forced to control themselves. The 49ers scored three straight touchdowns to take a 27-10 lead with 36 seconds left in the period, evoking memories of a Sunday night blowout during last October’s meeting between the two teams at Levi’s.

This time, however, the Cowboys made things very interesting. Prescott connected with star receiver Lamb CeeDee (13 catches, 146 yards) on two touchdowns in the fourth quarter on which the wide was wide open. These were somewhat redemptive moments for McCarthy, whose play designs seemed pretty far from bad in these instances — “He was open about those two (plays),” Prescott told me afterward — and for Lamb, whose the routes have recently been criticized by the great Troy Aikman, former Cowboys.

Did I mention there is a lot of noise surrounding this team?

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After Lamb’s second catch, with 3:32 left, Aubrey’s extra point cut the 49ers’ lead to 30-24. The jury was still out on whether the Cowboys could complete the return, a phrase that surely makes some of the second-year kicker’s teammates and coaches cringe, given the circumstances.

Aubrey, without consulting the team, showed up for jury duty on his day off last Tuesday and ended up being selected for a felony trial. This meant he would miss practice during the week; he compensated by showing up alone in the evening to work at the team’s training facility.

When he arrived at the Star on Thursday evening, the indoor practice field was being used to host a high school game. So he went to the outfield, where the sprinklers were on and the lights were off. “He kicked in the dark,” one witness said, rolling his eyes. “I guess it’s better than nothing.”

All of the Cowboys’ angst would have vanished if they had managed to pull away from Sunday’s game, which seemed plausible after Lamb’s touchdown. Already this season, the 49ers had twice blown 10-point fourth-quarter leads in losses to two division opponents, the Los Angeles Rams And Arizona Cardinals.

Could this happen again? The Cowboys ratcheted up the tension by forcing a three-and-out, taking over at their own 25-yard line with 3:05 remaining. Prescott, however, threw four straight incompletions, draining the game of its remaining suspense.

Afterward, he and Elliott spoke defiantly about the Cowboys’ prospects, insisting they were capable of warming up at the right time and running. “It’s a tough league and business,” Prescott said. “We’ve been through worse and we’ve gotten through it.”

Elliott said: “We have a very strong locker room and a very strong leadership group, and there is no quarterback I would rather fight against. In a month the situation could be completely different.

That would be a bit surprising, given that the Cowboys’ next four opponents – the Atlanta Falcons, Philadelphia Eagles, Houston Texans And Washington Commanders – all have winning records. In a meeting with his players (but no other coaches) after Dallas’ 47-9 home loss to the Detroit Lions Two weeks ago, McCarthy stressed the importance of staying together amid the growing chorus of negativity outside. As Diggs’ ostentatious confrontation with a member of the media showed, it’s not always as simple as it seems.

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“I have a bad feeling this might be one of those years,” one Cowboys executive said.

Sometimes, in football as in life, the barriers are too difficult to overcome. Jones wasn’t there to discuss the Cowboys’ loss Sunday night, but he sure won’t soon forget his trip to Levi’s. Multiple sources said Charlotte Jones may have suffered broken ribs, while Jerry Jones Jr. may have suffered a concussion. Both were examined by medical staff and allowed to watch the game from the family suite.

The incident injected a surreal tension into an already trying season, and when Cowboys players learned what had happened to the owner and his family, some had difficulty understanding.

“Unreal,” Prescott said as he sat at his locker, shaking his head. “The Cowboys can’t catch a break.”

(Top photo by Mike McCarthy: Kelley L Cox / Imagn Images)