ARLINGTON, Texas -- Ask the question all you want, but Jerry Jones continues to make it clear: When Tony Romo is healthy, he will lead the Dallas Cowboys.
"Tony is our No. 1 quarterback," said the Cowboys' owner and general manager, after his team's commanding 28-14 win against the Cincinnati Bengals.
Rookie Dak Prescott improved to 4-1 with Sunday's win. He has now gone 155 passes without an interception and needs eight more to break Tom Brady's NFL record for the most consecutive passes without an interception to start a career.
Prescott completed 18 of 24 passes for 227 yards and one touchdown pass against the Bengals. He also ran for a touchdown, his third of the season.
"We're going to have the luxury of being able to, I think, see them both," Jones said. "Now I don't want to take anything -- presume that Dak is going to be necessarily healthy. I don't want to presume anything like that, but I welcome the opportunity of having Dak playing at this level and Tony back in excellent health. It's going to be really special for the Cowboys."
Romo will have an MRI on Monday, and Jones said the expectation is it will show the quarterback's compression fracture suffered on Aug. 25 has fully healed. Romo has stepped up his conditioning work over the past few weeks and has been throwing for the past four weeks.
Jones did not want to name a possible return for Romo. However, Oct. 30 against the Philadelphia Eagles has been the target date.
Dallas plays at Green Bay on Sunday and then has its bye week.
Jones said Romo "is definitely on schedule."
Prescott has exceeded expectations, and the Cowboys matched last year's win total with Sunday's victory.
While some see a potential controversy in the future, Jones sees opportunity, harkening back to the difficulty the Cowboys had in finding Troy Aikman's replacement from 2000 to 2006, before Romo took over.
"I'll show you some hard days around here without a quarterback [that would] really want to make you pout, OK?" Jones said. "That's not a problem to have that."