Players have their normally scheduled off-day today and return to full-scale team work Wednesday. According to defensive end Marcus Spears, the players refer to this as being "thrown a bone" and appreciate the gesture.

"It's a morale boost," Spears said. "It gives you a hunger to play well and come back and prepare well for the next week."

Phillips had no reservations about giving the players a break so soon after last week's bye and a game in which they had eight penalties. It is wrong, Phillips said, to consider it a complete off day.

"It's not giving them anything, because they get the same things no matter what," Phillips said.

Seattle has lost four of its last five games.

Playing conditions: Owner and general manager Jerry Jones said no one with Atlanta complained to him about the playing conditions at Cowboys Stadium on Sunday.

Atlanta coach Mike Smith used a timeout after the first play of the second half to ask officials if something could be done about the sunlight that was blinding his offensive players. The field runs east to west, and the Falcons' offense looked into a setting sun. This was the first day game in the stadium.

Jones said natural light is part of the design principle of the stadium and no changes will be made for Football games. Jones said sunlight can be blocked for other events such as concerts.

The Cowboys' next home game, on Sunday against Seattle, is set for a 12:07 p.m. start.

Rossum has MRI: The Cowboys emerged from the Atlanta victory with one significant new injury: a pulled hamstring for kick returner Allen Rossum. He was injured on his first kickoff return.

Rossum underwent an MRI test, but Phillips did not elaborate on his condition.

By request, Felix Jones replaced Rossum on kickoff returns, but all remaining Atlanta kicks went for touchbacks. The Cowboys used Terrence Newman and Patrick Crayton on punt returns.

Newman lost 11 yards on his return. Crayton, recently demoted as the prime punt returner because of a series of bobbles, had a 73-yard scoring play among his three returns.

"Patrick came through for us, which I knew he would," Phillips said. "I think everybody on our team knew he would."

Briefly: Phillips said wide receiver Roy Williams appeared "rusty" in his return from a one-game absence because of bruised ribs. Williams caught only one of the five passes targeted to him. That dropped his reception rate to .400, with 12 receptions in 30 passes thrown to him. ... Pro Bowl voting began on NFL.com. The voting ends Dec. 21. ... Safety Pat Watkins was credited with four special-teams tackles against Atlanta, high on the club for the season. The kick-coverage units allowed only nine return yards on two punts and 85 return yards on eight kickoffs.