You can blame Tony Romo for his struggles. You can blame his receivers. You can blame the line, the coaching staff, a lot of things. Whatever you choose, things just are not getting done the way we have come to expect out of Romo, a gifted passer whose season has not come together. Say what you will about him, but Romo has talent. He threw 81 TD passes in his first 39 starts and completed nearly 64 percent of his passes coming into this season, but he is off to a tepid start with two poor games under his belt, including Sunday's loss to the Broncos.

The PFW spin

For the first time in his career, Romo has gone consecutive starts without a TD pass. In last Monday's win over the Panthers he was fairly efficient in guiding the Cowboys to victory, but he benefited from a strong run game and certainly didn't make any game-changing throws against a subpar defense. On Sunday, in the loss to the Broncos, Romo took five sacks and had two turnovers (one fumble, one interception) and missed several open receivers.

Part of it appears to be the design of the offense. The past two games, he was asked to throw mainly from the pocket, and his best plays were when he escaped from trouble to find his third and fourth options. He's one of those QBs who plays well when things break down, and perhaps the coaching staff factors this ability when it makes the game plan.

But there just haven't been enough rollout passes this season, which appear to play to his strengths. The Cowboys have good blockers at tight end and running back (although Marion Barber was clearly limited Sunday), but they didn't ask Romo to do much of that by design. That could change in the next few games.

It has been suggested that Romo appears to be scared to make mistakes now, having lost the edge that made him so good the past few seasons. Perhaps he doesn't have as much trust in his receivers as he has in the past, especially if teams — like the Broncos Sunday — sell out to take TE Jason Witten out of the offense.

It's almost as if there's no balance between the swashbuckling Romo and the game manager Romo, no happy medium. On the one hand, Romo wants to sling it, and if there's an interception, you can live to fight another drive. But on the other hand, Romo appears to be listening to the coaching of Wade Phillips and Co., who clearly are preaching not to turn the ball over. Without a middle ground there, Romo has become a middling quarterback. You almost have to wonder if it wouldn't be better to let someone like Mike Martz get his hands on Romo and just see what he could do without him worrying about playing things safely.

Teams have found out that you can pressure Romo, which allows him to use his athletic ability and creativity, or you can rush four most times and just keep him in the pocket. That's when he appears to have the most trouble. If he breaks contain, he's most dangerous.

Of course, it didn't hurt that WR Roy Williams was not in on the final drive of the game or that Witten most often was asked to block, leaving Sam Hurd and Miles Austin as your primary targets. Again, that appears to be coaching. It's hard to ask a guy like Romo to be this fine, this precise, given his strengths, not with what he has around him.

The offense is conservative. There are issues at receivers. And there are voices in Romo's head that are causing him to play outside himself. He might just be one of those colts you just let ride and worry about the consequences later. The Cowboys are at a crossroads and need to decide if they are going to unleash their guy or not.