LANDOVER, Md. -- Last December ended with Tony Romo slowly walking out of Valley Ranch after a Week 17 loss in which he could not play because of back surgery.
This December will end with Romo having the best season of his career.
He finished as the NFL’s leader in passer rating (113.2) and completion percentage (69.9) while throwing 34 touchdown passes, the second-most of his career. He had just nine interceptions on the season.
“For me, I was just excited to be able to get back to a level to do some of the things I learned,” Romo said after the Cowboys beat the Washington Redskins 44-17. “I was excited about trying things I used in the past. They’ve held up and really allowed me to play my best football. I think that was the most exciting thing about being healthy and getting better was just wanting to have another opportunity to go back and try to show that you can be a better version of yourself.”
That is not supposed to happen to a 34-year-old quarterback coming off two back surgeries in less than a year. It’s not supposed happen to a quarterback who suffered two transverse process fractures in October either.
Romo’s plus-25 touchdown-interception differential is the best of his career. Twice he was plus-21 (2011 and ’13). The Cowboys went 12-3 in his 15 starts. (He missed the Arizona Cardinals’ loss due to the back injury.) He also played through torn rib cartilage suffered on a hit against the Seattle Seahawks.
“I have been impressed by Tony Romo for a long time,” coach Jason Garrett said. “He is a hell of a football player and, again, I will use the same expression -- mental toughness and physical toughness. That is Line 1 when you describe him. I think he has demonstrated that throughout his career. There was no doubt in my mind that he was going to come back from surgery. I know how hard he worked in the offseason to come back and all the things he did to get himself to be the quarterback we have known him to be for a long time.”
Romo wasn’t about to take a victory lap of sorts on Sunday. He has just one playoff victory (2009 vs. the Philadelphia Eagles), and to some he still has to fight off the ghosts of the wild-card loss to the Seattle Seahawks in 2006 or the 2007 loss to the New York Giants in the divisional round.
“The division title is great,” Romo said. “For me and where I’m at, I think it is bigger aspirations. We’ve done the division title thing. I think that anytime you get 12 wins, it’s hard in the National Football League. We are proud of that but at the same time we understand that we are just getting started and we are excited about the opportunity.”
