It was a rough 2022 for Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott, who was spreading the football around and not all of in the right direction.
The Dallas Cowboys are coming off consecutive 12-5 seasons. The team has made two straight playoff appearance, a first for the franchise since 2006 and '07. However, these past two campaigns have ended the same way, with postseason setbacks to the San Francisco 49ers.
Quarterback Dak Prescott was certainly in the spotlight this past season, perhaps a little more than usual. He threw 23 touchdown passes in 12 regular-season contests, but he and Houston Texans' quarterback Davis Mills (who played in 15 games) were tied with a league-high 15 interceptions.
Prescott was picked off at least once in 10 of his dozen outings and explained that there were some other factors in that uncharacteristic turnover total.
Cowboys: Dak Prescott needs to cut back on the turnovers
"I know who I am, and you can go back and take away half of those off drops," explained the seven-year pro at his youth football camp earlier in July, per the Fort Worth Star-Telegram (via Bobby Kownack of NFL.com). "I'm not saying it's on the receiver, but if you cut that in half then we start talking about those, nobody is talking about it."
Yes and no. Prior to 2022, Prescott had thrown double-digit interceptions in three of the previous five seasons. Those picks were a little less magnified in 2021 because he came up with a career-high 37 touchdown passes, opposed to 10 INTs. There were also two more interceptions in the frustrating 2022 playoff loss at San Francisco.
All told, Prescott turned over the ball a combined 16 times in a dozen regular-season outings for Mike McCarthy's club this past season. One year earlier, he had that same number of miscues (16) when the team won the NFC East via 10 picks and six lost fumbles. Of course, that was in four more games.
The bottom line is that the talented pro has played in 97 regular-season games, thrown 165 TD passes and turned over the ball 90 times (65 INTs, 25 lost fumbles). So, was his 2022 performance all that different from previous years in the matter of ball security? Obviously, taking care of the football must become a bigger priority.