The Dallas Cowboys suffered a 24-16 Week 5 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on “Thursday Night Football.” It was a moment for the club to right the ship after a rocky start to the campaign, but the waves came crashing down on Dallas as Tampa Bay ran away with it with 17 unanswered points in the third quarter. It was so bad that even an employee at AT&T Stadium called out Dak Prescott in the tunnel after the game.

But the criticism didn't stop there. During Friday's broadcast of “NFL on ESPN,” Marcus Spears eviscerated the team's performance against the Buccaneers. He blasted the Cowboys for overlooking the Bucs, and claimed that if he had another word that was more than embarrassing, he would use that word instead to describe the club's outing vs. Tampa Bay.

“Embarrassing. Embarrassing. There's no close,” Spears said. “If it's another word that is more than embarrassing, that's what the game was. It's two things for me. This was 100% the most immature a** performance by the Dallas Cowboys. They walked into an NFL game and thought they were gonna have an easy game because [the opponent] was winless…

“But [it was] immaturity to me. This team was not prepared offensively or defensively,” Spears continued. “Like, who in the world don't know Todd Bowles is going to pressure you? And you're unable to protect? Dak Prescott played awful. Missed throws, dropped passes, dropped interceptions.”

"Embarrassing. There's no close. If it's another word that is more than embarrassing, that's what the game was."

Marcus Spears weighs in on the Cowboys' performance against the Bucs. pic.twitter.com/otRWMa2vk3

— NFL on ESPN (@ESPNNFL) October 9, 2026

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Prescott finished the game with 316 yards, one touchdown, and two interceptions while completing 57.1% of his pass attempts. It certainly did not help the Cowboys one bit when CeeDee Lamb exited the game early with a lower-body injury. George Pickens stepped up with a 130-yard, one-touchdown performance, but outside of that, there weren't too many bright spots in Dallas on Thursday night.

The Cowboys enter Week 6 with a 2-3 record and growing concerns. They'll have a few extra days to prepare for their next matchup, which is a road game scheduled for October 18 against the Green Bay Packers.