Instead of lamenting about what might have been, Dak Prescott is looking toward the future and what might be for the Dallas Cowboys in 2024. Prescott's teammate, tight end Jake Ferguson, said that the Cowboys' quarterback has put the team's disappointing finish to the 2023 season behind him.
After a 12-5 regular season, the Cowboys were upset by the Green Bay Packers during Super Wild Card Weekend. While the loss continued the Cowboys' trend of disappointing playoff showings, Prescott and his teammates are focused on what they can do moving forward.
"I know Dak is ready for the next season, that's all you can do," Ferguson told NFL Media. "You can't look back and you know, have any sort of just 'Oh, I made a bad play, so we lost.' No, it's just on to the next, it's over with, so we played that game, clock's zero, it's time to move on to the next week. We've got to get ready for this OTA session coming up, and then also fall camp and just get ready so if we do get in this situation down the road again, where we take advantage and we aren't really looking back, we're just going straight through the wall."
Despite all of his success, it appears that Prescott won't get the credit he likely deserves as a top-tier quarterback until he and the Cowboys make a deep playoff run. Troy Aikman, who won three Super Bowls during his Hall of Fame career with the Cowboys, recently compared Prescott's situation to Peyton Manning's prior to his and the Colts' victory in Super Bowl XLI.
"I still believe in Dak," Aikman said, via the team's website. "I feel like until you do it, there are always those criticisms. Peyton Manning heard that his first three years — he didn't win a playoff game — and then you look back at it now and you can't imagine anybody would question whether or not he could win a playoff game."
Aikman's belief in Prescott isn't based solely on blind faith. Over the course of his career, Prescott has shown time and time again his ability to put up numbers while also helping the Cowboys win games. He has a gaudy 73-41 record as the Cowboys' starting quarterback during the regular season. Last season, Prescott led the NFL in attempts and touchdown passes while leading Dallas to a division crown.
As Aikman knows, football is a team sport, and until the Cowboys build a championship roster around Prescott, they will continue to fall short. That being said, Prescott surely knows that he has to raise his game in future playoff games if the Cowboys are going to snap their Super Bowl drought, which now stands at 28 years.
As far as what they learned from their recent playoff loss, Ferguson said that the Cowboys have to be prepared to take everyone's best shot, regardless of the week or the situation.
"I think for me, it's also the NFL, 32 of the best [teams] in the world are playing one sport against each other but at the same time I always like to think, 'We're the Dallas Cowboys, every team that's going to play us is going to bring their all every single time,'" Ferguson said. "We're not going to get anybody's 'We don't have to bring that hard against them.' They're bringing their all against us. It's a kill-or-be-killed mentality. We've just got to kill them first."
