IRVING, Texas — Miles Austin returned to his native New Jersey this weekend as a feel-good story that doesn’t feel all that good anymore for the Cowboys.
An undrafted wide receiver from Monmouth College who erupted out of nowhere with a 1,300-yard, 11-touchdown season in 2009, Austin is now mainly the butt of cynical jokes here for his unfortunate combination of huge contract and inability to stay healthy.
Austin is expected back in the lineup Sunday when Dallas faces off against the Giants in an important NFC East game for both teams at MetLife Stadium. It will mark just his sixth appearance of the season and his first since Oct. 20 because of a nagging hamstring injury.
Austin has missed 11 games the past 2 ¹/₂ seasons due to various ailments, which — combined with the Cowboys’ failure to make the playoffs and his own failure to come anywhere close to matching his 2009 breakout — has turned the Summit, N.J., native defensive and camera-shy.
Austin had to be prodded by Cowboys officials into speaking to reporters last week, and he was uptight throughout the brief, uncomfortable session.
“I can’t control anything other than what I’m doing,” Austin said when asked if he was upset by the local fan and media skepticism. “I don’t try to use negative things to push me positively. I just try to focus on what I need to do and keep it positive.”
Austin’s problem is the massive expectations he created in his first full NFL season as a wide receiver in 2009.
Primarily a kick returner his first three seasons, the 6-foot-3, 215-pound Austin busted out that season with 81 catches for 1,320 yards and the team-leading 11 touchdowns as the Cowboys finished 11-5 and won a playoff game for the first time since 1996.
Austin made the Pro Bowl that year and did it again in 2010 on the strength of 69 receptions for 1,041 yards and seven touchdowns, but it has been a steady downhill trip for him since then.
Austin hasn’t cracked 1,000 yards in a season since, and he has just 13 touchdown catches in the past 2¹/₂ seasons combined — including zero scores in five games this season.
That wouldn’t be such a problem if not for something that wasn’t even his doing — the seven-year, $54.1 million contract with $18 million guaranteed that Jerry Jones handed Austin immediately after his bust-out campaign in 2009.
The deal has been restructured twice by Jones since then to help ease the Cowboys’ salary-cap woes, but all that has done is ratchet up the pressure on Austin.
That’s because cutting Austin after this year would cost Dallas a whopping $15 million in “dead money” against the cap over the succeeding three seasons, while keeping him would mean he will take up $8.2 million in cap room in 2014, $9.6 million in 2015 and $12.5 million in 2016.
That’s a lot of money — especially with each team’s overall cap expected to remain relatively flat during that same time period — for a No. 2 receiver who can’t seem to stay out of the trainer’s room.
It seems especially wasteful this season, considering Austin counts nearly $4 million against the Cowboys’ cap yet hasn’t caught a pass since Week 3 and hasn’t played in a game since Week 7.
Not only that, but in the last two games in which he played, Austin didn’t record a catch despite Tony Romo throwing seven passes in his direction.
“I catch passes in practice and catch balls all the time,” Austin said Friday when asked if he feels it has been too long since he has caught a pass. “It’s not much different. But no, it doesn’t feel too long.”
Austin actually started off this season on an encouraging note, catching 10 passes for 72 yards in Dallas’ 36-31 opening-night victory over the Giants at AT&T Stadium.
The fact he will be facing the same team again Sunday, and doing so in front of friends and family not far from where he grew up, has the Cowboys optimistic Austin can get back on track starting this weekend.
“He’s a difference-making player for us, and he has been for the last few years,” Cowboys coach Jason Garrett said last week. “He’s a starter for a reason. He can be a very difficult matchup for opposing defenses. He’s a big guy who is also quick and explosive. We try to use him appropriately, and he’ll certainly help the other guys out just having his presence out there.”
Austin reportedly felt healthy enough to return two weeks ago in the Cowboys’ primetime matchup with the Saints, but was overruled by Garrett and the medical staff because they felt an extra week off combined with the bye would ensure Austin’s hamstring was as healthy as possible for the 5-5 Cowboys’ important stretch run.
“The biggest thing we’ve focused on with Miles is simply to get him healthy,” Garrett said.
But as the Cowboys have found out repeatedly since Jones backed up the Brink’s truck four years ago, keeping Austin on the field is a chore.