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Romo outplaying top pick Manning

By Dan Ralph

He was undrafted in 2003 and signed with Dallas as an unheralded rookie free agent. But now Tony Romo has the Cowboys in the driver’s seat in the NFC.

Romo outplayed Eli Manning, the first player taken in the ‘04 draft, and guided the Cowboys to a 31-20 victory over the New York Giants on Sunday. That improved Dallas’s record to 8-1 - tied with upstart Green Bay for the best mark in the conference - for a two-game lead over the Giants atop the NFC East Division.

Romo finished the game 20-of-28 passing for 247 yards and four touchdowns. He has thrown a total of eight touchdown passes in Dallas’s two wins over the Giants this season.

Manning wasn’t bad, completing 23-of-34 passes for 236 yards and a touchdown, but also threw two interceptions and also couldn’t match Romo’s knack of using his mobility to get himself out of trouble. Manning’s quarterback rating was 72.7 compared to 123.1 for Romo.

And Manning is 0-3 in head-to-head matchups against Romo. Into his fourth NFL season, Manning has yet to consistently show that he’s been worthy of the plethora of draft picks the Giants gave up to secure him from the San Diego Chargers.

Romo, on the other hand, is a bona fide NFL star after just 20 career starts and Oct. 29 signed a six-year, $67.5-million extension with the Cowboys.

That’s a heady accomplishment, indeed, for someone who played his college football at Eastern Illinois, a Division 1-AA school, and found himself third on the Cowboys depth chart behind Quincy Carter and Chad Hutchinson when he first reported to the NFL team‘s training camp in 2003.

Especially telling also was that New York was a) healthy, and b) coming off a bye week while Dallas was on the second of two consecutive road trips to the East coast.

But Romo has consistently done a solid job this season of using his mobility and running ability to elude the opponents’ pass rush. Sunday’s game was a fine example of this as Romo was sacked just once by the Giants, who were often left behind in a cloud of dust in their pursuit of the Cowboys quarterback as he looked downfield for the open receiver.

He’s also been very good at keeping controversial receiver Terrell Owens happy - and therefore quiet. Owens had six catches for 125 yards and two touchdowns against the Giants.

More importantly, Romo has made Cowboys fans forget about his embarrassing faux pas that eliminated Dallas from the NFL playoffs last season. It was his botched snap on a 19-yard field-goal try with 1:19 remaining _ and subsequent tackle at the one-yard line _ that allowed Seattle to nip the Cowboys 21-20 in the NFC wildcard game. Footage of the play, a dejected Romo, sitting on the turf by himself, was repeatedly played on television to further emphasize his miscue.

To his credit, Romo stood up and faced the music then. Truth be known, he found himself as the holder on the play because it’s the job he had at the start of the year when he was the club’s backup.

Now the Cowboys’ undisputed offensive leader, Romo is also battling boyhood hero Brett Favre for top quarterback honours in the NFC.

Favre has completed 238-of-354 passes for 2,757 yards with 16 touchdowns against eight interceptions. Romo is 190-of-292 passing for 2,555 yards with 23 touchdowns against 11 interceptions.

Romo’s rating is 103.3 compared to 96.2 for Favre.

And, coincidently, Romo and Favre have led their teams to respective 8-1 records. But it’s the Cowboys who many feel are in a position where they’re unofficially the NFL’s second-best team behind the unbeaten New England Patriots.

Again, not bad for the kid from San Diego who slipped into the NFL unnoticed five years ago and is now one of a star with one of the league’s highest-profile teams.