ARLINGTON -- The kid named Kellen Moore made his NFL debut and completed 60 percent of his passes. Make it 72 percent if you count the ones the Jets caught. The fans treated him like a conquering hero, anyway, and even the media seemed desperate for more Moore after New York's 19-16 victory at AT&T Stadium finally eliminated a bad 4-10 Cowboys team from contention.

Cowboys owner Jerry Jones was asked two questions about Moore regarding whether the team had erred by not getting him onto the field sooner. I realize Matt Cassel was bad (in fact I have realized that for some time), but it's funny to see Moore go 15-for-25 for 158 yards with one TD and three interceptions and be talked about as if he's the answer to some burning question for this destitute team.

The Cowboys have no answers. And for the second time this century they will follow up a playoff win (these are their only two playoff wins in those 15 years) with a season filled with 10 losses. Or more.

Sure, it's fun to watch Moore putting it up for grabs, but there's little chance he has anything approaching what could fairly be called an NFL arm. At six feet tall, he looks to be forever throwing uphill. He's interesting if for no other reason than that he's left-handed which caused some of the veterans to puzzle over the last southpaw quarterback to throw a pass for the Cowboys.

When Brad Sham doesn't remember, it either has been awhile or never happened (my vote).

I know that Paul McDonald of USC was on the roster in my mid-'80s beat-writing days, but he didn't throw a pass. So it could be that Moore is going where no Cowboys quarterback has gone before although this team is merely going to Buffalo to play out the string on a miserable season.

"I hate the way it's turned out,'' defensive end Jeremy Mincey said. "It's definitely hard on me because I'm at the end of the road here. Just gotta keep grinding it out.''

Mincey's not alone at being at or near the end of his time here. Every team makes changes in the free-agency era, but teams that finish somewhere between 6-10 and 4-12 are bound for more than token alterations.

"The reality is that we go to Buffalo, then play Washington here and then that next week is when the cold, hard light of day hits you, when you're not playing,'' Jones said. "That's when you start counting up your assets for the coming years.''

And it won't take long for Jones to start mining the hidden gold that comes with a lost season.

"We've got to take advantage of this,'' he said. "The entire system -- if you've had the season we've had -- it's set up to give you the advantage in talent coming up for next year.

"I do see us having one of the best quarterbacks in the league for the next three or four years. I do see that. But I have really ended up holding the bag relative to thinking you could be a contender and not have a backup plan. And maybe even a backup to the backup.''

Although head coach Jason Garrett steered clear of announcing depth chart changes, Moore presumably will become the fourth quarterback to start for the Cowboys this season when the team gets to Buffalo. That's never a good thing.

But the team has to avoid writing off 2015 as a lost cause related solely to Romo's absence. In games started by backup quarterbacks, the Cowboys may be 1-9 but other teams around the league, similarly challenged, are winning. Some even appear to be playoff-bound. The quarterback position is huge but it's not the entire story.

The play of the Dallas defense tells us as much. Without a doubt a superior unit to the offense this season, the Cowboys' defense picked up just its ninth takeaway of the season Saturday night -- an interception by Terrance Mitchell, who wasn't even a Cowboy a week ago.

The NFL record for fewest takeaways is 11. There are no assurances this defense won't assign itself to an obscure part of the league record book for its inability to produce turnovers. And the valid reasons for that, related to playing alongside a really bad offense, won't change the fact that this defense has to become more productive someway somehow.

There is much to consider and, as Jones mentioned, there is plenty of time for players and management to ponder the future starting Jan. 4.

Twitter: @TimCowlishaw