In November and December of last year it seemed that at least once in every game one of the announcers would remark on Marion Barber’s higher yards-per-carry average and mention that he should be starting ahead of Julius Jones. No doubt, we’ll hear much of the same come training camp and pre-season.

The numbers do favor Marion Barber. His 654 yards on 135 carries amounts to a 4.8 average while Julius ran for 1,084 yards on 267 carries for a 4.1 average. Barber also had 14 touchdowns compared to Jones’ 4 touchdowns.

But numbers do not tell the whole story.

What the numbers don’t tell you is that Barber came into the game on third downs, in goal line situations and, most importantly, was frequently used as the every down back late in the game. He received twice as many carries in the second half than he did in the first half. This means that he got the bulk of his carries when the defense was tired, and his numbers show this. His yards per carry average in the first half was 3.8 while his yards per carry average in the second half was 5.3.

The whole story is that, while Marion Barber had a higher average, he got that average by running against a defense already tired from chasing Julius Jones around for two or three quarters and thus reaped the benefits in much the same way as he reaped the benefits by coming into the game in goal line situations and carrying the ball for that last ten yards.

It was a good system. Dallas produced over 1,700 yards and 18 touchdowns between the two of them. By way of comparison, only LaDainian Tomlinson (1,815 yards) and Larry Johnson (1,789 yards) rushed for more yards than the Jones-Barber tandem. (Noting, of course, that Tomlinson and Johnson were both spelled by backups as well — though both of them are considered all-purpose backs and not part of a tandem.)

And, don’t get me wrong, Marion Barber is a good back that deserves credit for his hard-nosed running style. What is sometimes forgotten — especially by those announcers — is that Julius Jones’ job in the offense was to be completely unselfish. He did the bulk of the work running against a fresh defense and when he helped get the Cowboys into scoring position someone else came in to get the touchdown, and when he had ran enough to wear down the defense someone else got to come in and run against the tired defenders.

In short, Julius Jones deserves a lot of credit — not just for having a solid 1,000+ yard season — but for fulfilling an extremely unselfish role in the offense without complaint, without distracting ‘just give me the damn balls’ rants on the sidelines, without causing division within the team. He was bound to have felt sorely used at times — no competitor likes to be taken out of the game, especially at crunch time — but he did his job, and he did it well.

Had Julius Jones received Marion Barber’s carries and simply kept up with his 4.1 yards per carry average he would have had over 1,600 yards (good enough for fifth in the NFL just ahead of Steven Jackson and right behind Tiki Barber). And, no doubt, had he ran for over 1,600 yards no one would be talking about whether or not he should be the starting running back.

Again, this is not to say that Marion Barber doesn’t deserve his fair share of credit. He did a great job of finding the end zone in goal line situations and ran with power late in the game. No, this is simply to say that Marion Barber *did* get his fair share of the credit, and he got a slice of credit from Julius’s plate as well. The announcers that were giving him that slice from Julius’s plate were simply looking at the numbers and not looking at the game — something that isn’t really that uncommon coming from announcers and the media in general.

Does Marion Barber deserve a shot at the starting running back position? Sure. He did a great job last year and, really, everyone deserves a shot at the starting position in training camp and preseason. Competition is good.

Should the Cowboys change up a running scheme that produced 1,700+ yards last season? I would think twice about it. I would think three and four times before making any major changes. Overall, I would prefer the guy with the speed and the elusiveness going against the fresh defense and the guy with the power and the fresh legs going against the tired defense. Certainly, there are a lot of ways to slice up the pie, and I could see trying to even out the carries throughout the game, but I do have a preference to not fix what isn’t broken, and I don’t think the Cowboys running game last year was broken.