Jimmy Johnson: 'Country Club' Cowboys Not as Bad as They Looked vs. Saints

Maybe he's getting soft at the advanced age of 81. Or perhaps his induction into the Ring of Honor last December has de-fanged his biting criticism of Jerry Jones' team.

Or ... could it actually be that the Dallas Cowboys aren't as bad as they looked in Sunday's 44-19 blowout loss to the New Orleans Saints at AT&T Stadium? While Dallas-Fort Worth is frantically and angrily scouring mock drafts in knee-jerk preparation for a 1-16 season, the two-time Super Bowl coach on Monday was cutting the Cowboys some surprising slack.

"New Orleans is very good, but early in the season it's hard to get a read on some of these teams because nobody plays in the preseason," Johnson said on FS1's Colin Cowherd show. "The only teams that you can really count on in September are the veteran ones that haven't had any changes. The Saints are one of those teams, while the Cowboys completely changed their defensive scheme plus they lost some good players. Let's give everybody a couple more weeks before we say 'Hey, they're really good or really bad'. But New Orleans is going to be a dangerous team."

Johnson, the long-time analyst on FOX's NFL Sunday, did take a swipe at the Cowboys and their "country club" culture. But he also thinks it is premature to write off a talented team with a seasoned defensive coordinator in Mike Zimmer, even in the wake of allowing the Saints to score five touchdowns on their first possessions in an embarrassing 35-point first half.

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"Dallas is a unique situation because they are so visible and they have so many fans, and so many people tell them how great they are after one win," Johnson said. "In that environment they don't develop that toughness and the overcoming-adversity-type-of-thing. They've got the country club-type life. You've got to have the type of coach that's going to drill it in them.

"But Zimmer's a good coach and he'll figure it out."

Johnson's excuses notwithstanding, it has to be alarming that the Cowboys in recent games - going back to last season - have trailed the Buffalo Bills 31-3, the Green Bay Packers 48-16 and the Saints by 25.