IRVING, Texas - Here is a novel idea to compensate for the lack of healthy wide receivers.

And this is going to be a little different, you know me. I've got no problem with the Cowboys probably leaning more heavily on tight end Jason Witten when the team needs to employ a three-receiver set or lining up Marion Barber and Felix Jones in the backfield, then doing something fancy with Jones motioning out. That's cool.

So is signing an insurance policy at the end of the week, as long as I can cancel it out once Miles Austin, Sam Hurd and Isaiah Stanback are back to snuff, and just know that policy might be Stanback since he harnessed his bum shoulder together so he could practice out here on a hot and quite humid Monday (feels like 97).

If not, my guess is it's Mike Jefferson, but probably not until Friday since no other names came floating by on the waiver wire that made me go oooh.

Just as soon take my chances with my top two guys, Terrell Owens and Patrick Crayton, maybe Stanback if he can go, or Jefferson, and then put in a couple of plays for maybe Terence Newman or Adam Jones just in case if need be. But come on, be serious, how much can a newcomer learn in three days that would be any better than lining up Witten in the slot or motioning Felix Jones out wide or having Newman or Pacman run a couple of go-routes down the sideline? So to my point: How 'bout it defense? Step right up in this time of need.

Maybe a scaled-down Cowboys offense can't come out and score thirtysomething, as it did in half the games last year. Maybe this depleted offense can't put up at least 24 points as it did in 13 of last year's 16 regular-season games, the Cowboys winning 12 of those. But that doesn't mean you have to lose.

Come on, hold up one of those silly grandstand signs. You know, the ones with "De-(picture of a white, picket fence)." And there is no reason why not. This Cowboys defense should come into it's own in 2008, and just because the Cowboys might not hit last year's scoring average of 28 points a game shouldn't mean they have to lose.

"We have the potential to be one of the best units in the NFL," Cowboys defensive end Chris Canty said, "but potential means you haven't done it yet."

Well, it's time.

The generally accepted line of demarcation for defenses in the NFL is 17 points. Hold your opponent to no more than 17 points, and chances are you are going to win the game. Let's use the 2007 season as Exhibit 1. In the 256 games played, the winning team scored more than 17 points 216 times. Only 40 times did a team win scoring no more than 17 points, meaning only 40 times did teams holding an opponent to no more than 17 points lose. That's an .843 success rate.

Exhibit 2, the Cowboys: In the 14 games they scored more than 17 points they were 13-1. In the two games they scored less than 17 points, they were 0-2.

And Exhibit 3: In the seven games the Cowboys held opponents to no more than 17 points, they went 6-1, losing only to Philadelphia, 10-6.

So there are other ways to win in this league, and as Cowboys head coach Wade Phillips said on Monday, "We feel we're a team."

Meaning, sometimes one unit has to compensate for the other, and no unit shoulders blame.

So to me, the onus is on the defense in this season opener, needing to do a job on what was a highly productive Cleveland offense in 2007, the main reason the Browns finished 10-6 last year. And don't thumb your nose at 10-6, even if they did not qualify for the playoffs. That's the Browns' second-best record since going 10-6 in 1988, even if there was a three-year gap in there (1996-98) after owner Art Modell moved the operation, but technically not the Browns franchise, to Baltimore.

But executing this idea of mine won't be easy. The Browns were the eighth-ranked offense last year, and the eighth-ranked scoring offense (402), and just one of eight teams, including the Cowboys (455), to score at least 400 points last year.

Think about this also: Cleveland quarterback Derek Anderson threw for 3,787 yards. For perspective, until Tony Romo threw for 4,211 yards last season, Anderson's total would have been second in Cowboys' history. Anderson also threw 29 touchdown passes, and until Romo threw 36 last year, that would have tied the Cowboys' single-season high.

We got all excited last season when Terrell Owens broke the team's long-standing touchdown reception record of 14 by one. Well, Cleveland's Braylon Edwards finished with 16 TD receptions, those two going two-three in the league, only trailing Rand Moss' 23.

There is more. Owens finished with 81 catches last year. Edwards had 80. Owens finished with 1,355 yards receiving. Edwards had 1,289, ranking them fifth and seventh, respectively, in the NFL. Owens averaged 16.7 yards a catch, Edwards 16.1, and they were the only two receivers in the NFL's top 43 in receptions to even average 16 yards a catch.

And when it came to rushing yards, why Jamal Lewis went for 1,304 yards. The Cowboys haven't had a running back rush for more since Emmitt Smith did so (1,397) in 1999. Plus, Marion Barber's team-leading 10 rushing touchdowns last year were but one more than Lewis' nine.

So if you thought the Cowboys had a formidable offense last year, well, the Browns weren't too far behind. And frankly, I would not put too much stock in their 0-4 preseason record, just the second time in club history they've gone 0-4 in the preseason. Nor would I worry too much about the Browns not having won a division title since 1989. They got it going on . . . at least on offense.

Just think about this: Of the Browns' 10 wins last year, seven of those came at home, meaning they lost only one home game in 2007, that the opener, leaving them on a current seven-game home winning streak.

This would not seem the opportune time to land on the banks of Lake Erie with injuries leaving one offensive hand stuck in your back pocket. Again, I'm not saying Jason Garrett won't find ways to move the ball effectively with the offensive likes of Romo, Barber, Owens, Crayton, Witten and Felix Jones as his primary weapons.

Shoot, with all that, a third receiver could play - Stanback still might, practicing on Monday - and never touch the ball.

But sometimes you've just got to win a game scoring fewer than the Cowboys' 28-point average of 2007, and the Cowboys checked in less than 28 last year only six times. They finished 3-3 in those games.

Catch my drift . . . defense?

"Now it's time to be focused," Cowboys linebacker Bradie James said, "and it's about results."

That's right, results, as in team results. Those football-scoring dudes on the other side of the ball might need a helping hand come Sunday in Cleveland. And when the defense essentially adds a Tank Johnson - OK, he played last year but only for half a season, and now the real Tank is here - Pacman Jones, Zach Thomas, first-round pick Mike Jenkins, fifth-round pick Orlando Scandrick and a healthy Terence Newman and Anthony Henry to four returning Pro Bowlers, you ought to get results.

And that would be the surest cure for a short-handed offense.

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