Coach Killers, Week 10: Roy Williams

Every week, NFL FanHouse hits the lowlights from Sunday's action, looking at those players who did the most to move their head coaches that much closer to returning to the Bed and Breakfast business.

This is where the divide between fantasy and reality becomes apparent.

For fantasy owners who had him in their lineups, Roy Williams, who posted five catches for 105 yards and a touchdown -- his best game of the season and his best yardage day since Nov. 18, 2007 -- was probably a factor in a winning performance.

But for the Cowboys, Williams was a primary factor in a momentum-killing 17-7 loss to the struggling Packers.

To be sure, Williams' performance had some positives to it -- he outgained the game's next two leading receivers combined, he scored the Cowboys' only points, and he had the game's longest gain -- a 41-yard catch ...

... and that's where the negatives come in. That 41-yard catch? It could have been a 72-yard touchdown. With no score in the game and four minutes left until half, Williams motioned into the slot and ran a seam route one-on-one against safety Nick Collins, who couldn't turn his hips quickly enough to run effectively with Williams. Williams caught the pass about 32 yards downfield and had no one in front of him; had he kept his path straight ahead, it's almost definitely a six-point play. Instead, he cut left, directly into Charles Woodson, at the Packers' 30-yard line. Woodson got a hand on the ball and knocked it loose, and the Packers recovered.

Early in the third quarter, on a 2nd-and-13 from the Dallas 43-yard line with the Packers leading 3-0, Tony Romo lofted a pass to a wide-open Williams that would have picked up the first down and put the Cowboys in Green Bay territory. Except for one thing -- the ball went right through Williams' hands. Two plays later, the Cowboys punted, and the Packers scored to take a 10-0 lead.

Those two plays combined represented at best a 17-point swing (the lost touchdown, the missed opportunity for a field goal on the drop and the Packer touchdown that followed).

"The fumble, it's on me," Williams said after the game. "The one in the lights, that's on me, but if the lights weren't there that's a caught ball."

Oh, well then. Cowboys fans can rest easy -- it's not like the lights are on in every NFL stadium during every football game. Ahem.

"I'm going to account for that. I lost this game for this football team. That's the way I feel."

Williams says he's not T.O., and I believe him. I don't recall, after all, Owens ever taking responsibility for a loss, as Williams did in the wake of the Packers game. Still, that doesn't change the fact that earlier in this season Williams griped about his lack of production, saying "[Miles Austin] gets the ball thrown correctly his way. I'm stretching and falling and doing everything. Everybody [else] who's been here's balls are there. Our footballs (from Romo to Williams) are everywhere right now."

Williams was griping about the chemistry that he and Romo have, not about his role in the offense, and even if the film supports his opinion -- that he isn't/wasn't getting the ball in catchable situations -- it came off lousy, smacking of jealousy at a time when the team was winning and Miles Austin was emerging as one of the top threats in the league this season.

But Williams' performance against the Packers makes the words even lousier.

Williams calls himself the No. 1 receiver, but as I've discussed previously in this space, being a No. 1 receiver isn't about big numbers but game-changing plays. It doesn't matter if nine out of every 10 Williams targets are ducks that land in the first row. He's got to make the one available play. On Sunday, he had two huge chances to tilt the game in Dallas' favor, and he let both slip through his hands. Though it showed up in the box score where those two chances didn't, the touchdown he caught with 38 seconds left in a hopeless game was absolutely meaningless.

Miles Austin has put up the numbers and made the game-changing plays, and that's why he's getting the love this year. Meanwhile, Williams' words and lack of meaningful contribution have only intensified the negative spotlight on the Texas native.

Be careful with that glare, though, Cowboys fans -- Williams is sensitive to bright lights.