BRITTLE ROMO GIVES COWBOYS A SCARE
Little-known fact: “Romo” in Scooby-Doo-ese. translates to “Oh, no.”
As in, “Romo, Raggy!” (Or, “Oh no, Shaggy!”)
Hanna-Barbera cartoon dialogue aside, “Oh, no” has been a common interjection of Dallas Cowboys fans over the past decade, whenever Tony Romo is on the field.
Until the past few years, usually it was shouted in anger, after a ruinous Romo interception.
But over the past few seasons it’s been shouted in concern, when the aging, ever-less gaffeprone but evermore brittle quarterback falls in agony to the turf, unable to get up.
We saw it again Thursday night, early in the Cowboys’ pre-season game at Seattle. Seconds after his third snap, in his first action of the pre-season, Romo dropped to pass, rolled left, started to run and, as he went to slide, got hit hard in the back by fast-closing Seattle pass rusher Cliff Avril.
Romo immediately writhed in pain on the ground, reaching for his back. Romo, Raggy, indeed. The local Seattle telecast showed a glimpse of Cowboys owner/GM Jerry a few minutes later, sitting in his visiting owner’s suite at CenturyLink Field, looking like he’d just been punched in the gut by George Foreman.
“I was just in shock,” Jones later told a Dallas TV station. “I had my mind on, ‘Come on, Tony, get up.’ (I) said a few prayers right there.”
After being tended to on the field by virtually every doctor and trainer from the Cowboys’ sideline, Romo got up and walked off without aid.
He did not return to the game. The plan had been for him to play only two series anyway. Steve Wyche of NFL Network reported that Romo took some simulated snaps, threw a few passes and asked to go back in.
No way. Head coach Jason Garrett would have been crazy even to consider it, and didn’t.
“His back was bothering him a little bit after that play,” Garrett told a Dallas telecast interviewer at halftime. “We don’t think it’s a serious thing, and we just felt better keeping him out.”
Romo later said, “That was probably as tough a hit as I’ve taken on my back in the last five years.”
Romo added that he did not feel it was necessary to have his back X-rayed afterward.
Jones said Romo is still scheduled to start the Cowboys regular-season opener on Sept. 11, and he confirmed Romo won’t play in the Cowboys’ final preseason game next Thursday.
This past March, Romo had surgery on his left clavicle, after breaking that bone twice last season and for the third time since 2010. He missed all but four games last year as Dallas plummeted from NFC East champ in 2014 to a 4-12 record.
The corrective surgery Romo underwent is called a “Mumford procedure,” to reduce pain. Surgeons shaved a portion off the problematic clavicle bone where it meets the shoulder.
Romo also has battled chronic back pain in recent seasons.
Sports-talk radio and Twitter only half-jokingly obsessed Friday over how many games Romo might actually play in 2016.