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The Cowboys have had a worse stretch than this, but here's why that was so different 

Kristi Scales, the sideline reporter for the Dallas Cowboys radio network, answered your questions about the team Wednesday. Here are some highlights:

Have you ever seen a worse three game stretch by a Cowboys team in your career?

Scales: Yes, the end of the 2002 season was totally miserable. That was the dog days of the Quincy Carter/Chad Hutchinson era. The Cowboys lost the final four games that season to finish 5-11 for the third consecutive season. That was a sad time because there were really good veterans like Emmitt Smith and Darren Woodson and Larry Allen and Flozell Adams and Andre Gurode and LaRoi Glover and Dat Nguyen and Dexter Coakley who were stuck on a bad team. It was near the end of the run for some guys who had experienced good times earlier in the Cowboys' careers.

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That was some bad football, but the expectations were low for that team. They were 5-11 the previous year, too.

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What makes this season's current three-game losing streak so disappointing and frustrating is that this team has talent and high expectations. Coming off a 13-win season, this year's squad was supposed to contend for an NFC Championship. And now they're under .500 and face a critical game to keep playoff hopes alive.

So have I seen worse football? Yes, for sure. But those weren't good teams. This is a good team going through a really rough stretch. Guys aren't making plays. They're getting strummed in the second halves of games. So while there have been worse stretches, this one is the most disappointing.

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Which Cowboy has played 200 consecutive games of mistake-free football?

Scales: Cowboys long snapper L.P. Ladouceur played his 200th career regular season game on Thanksgiving Day. And through his first 200 regular season games, he has snapped cleanly 1,810 consecutive times. That total includes: 873 punts, 550 extra points, and 387 field goals.

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He's also snapped cleanly through sevem career playoff games.

His 13 seasons with the Cowboys began on a mid-week tryout.

"I was given a chance midway through the week, a month into the 2005 regular season, because the Cowboys were in California the week between back-to-back game in San Francisco and Oakland," recalls Ladouceur. "I was living in Davis, California (between Oakland and Sacramento) when the Cowboys called me. I went to college at Cal-Berkeley in the Bay Area. I had spent that summer with the New Orleans Saints as an undrafted rookie free agent at training camp. I got released by the Saints at the end of August.

"It was the week between Games 3 and 4 of the regular season. I had a few workouts for other NFL teams. I got a call from Bruce (DeHaven, former Cowboys special teams coordinator). The Cowboys were my third workout. It was an hour-and-a-half drive from Davis to San Jose where the Cowboys were practicing that week in-between games at San Jose State University. It was a Tuesday. I told Bruce I'd be there for the workout.

"To think it's been 200 games since then, it's been a blessing. Nobody could ever think they'd play that long. The think about this league is 'taking advantage of an opportunity'. That's what happened for me. The person I replaced on the Cowboys' roster that week was Jon Condo. His mistake in the game at San Francisco was my fortune. Ironically, he went to Oakland the following year and he's still with the Raiders. So he's done well and played 13 years just like me."

Ladouceur has changed his approach over the course of 13 seasons.

"When I first came in the league, the coaches and everybody else had the approach of 'you've got to snap it as hard as you can,' speed was the key," notes Ladouceur. "But after a few years I learned that speed is not the thing because punters or holders can mishandle the snaps. So I thought, 'I'm not going to try to fire it back there, I'm going to give them a catchable ball'.

"So that has changed over the years. I don't snap it as fast as I did in college. My snap is very consistent speed-wise."

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And what is the speed on long snaps?

"On punts, snaps need to be .75 seconds because we try to execute our punts in less than 2 seconds. Chris gets the punt away in 1.25 seconds, plus my .75 seconds on the snap (which covers 15 yards). If you have a snapper that's .68, then the punter has a little more time - 1.32 - but I've noticed the punters have harder times catching those snaps, especially if it's cold.

"For field goals and PATS (extra points) our full execution of snap/hold/kick is 1.3 seconds. I don't know the speed of my particular snap because we calculate the entire operation, but it's probably .3 (covering 8 yards from line of scrimmage to the spot of the ball for place kicks).

"Accuracy is more important than speed. If this were baseball, I wouldn't be a closer, I'd be a 7th-inning guy. My job is to make sure the ball gets there the right way."

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Click here to view the full chat transcript.