The Dallas Cowboys have been perhaps the most disappointing team in the NFL this year. They entering the season hoping to reach their first Super Bowl since 1995; instead, they are 3-8 and dead last in the woeful NFC East.
It seems unlikely that Jerry Jones would fire Mike McCarthy after just one season, but assuming that McCarthy will automatically right the ship in 2021 feels a bit hollow, no?
“It is pretty hollow because you’re looking at the success that he had in Green Bay,” two-time Super Bowl champion David Diehl said on Tiki & Tierney. “The thing that you have to take into account, though, is outside of just the injuries and the play-calling, think about the situational decisions that Mike McCarty has made this year.”
“These are things that have repetitively come up this entire season, and when that happens, you’re not winning football games and there’s a divide in the locker room,” Diehl said. “You’re getting [second-guessed by] players, whether it’s the practice habits or ‘We need to simplify things’ or ‘We want to run these types of [plays].’ None of those things lead to a championship culture and winning.”
Six Cowboys have attempted passes this season. Four quarterbacks, including Ben DiNucci and Garrett Gilbert, have been called upon to win games.
They didn’t.
“I think you have to take into account how much Dak Prescott meant to that football team,” Diehl said. “From a leadership standpoint, from a defensive standpoint, they believed that if Dak Prescott was the quarterback, it allowed them to blitz more, be more aggressive on the defensive side of the ball, because he was able to bail them out so many times.”
Despite their struggles, the Cowboys trail the Giants (4-7) by just one game in the NFC East. Dallas plays each of its next two games on the road at Baltimore (6-4) on Dec. 8 and at Cincinnati (2-8-1) on Dec. 13. Kickoff against the Ravens is slated for 8:05 p.m. ET.