Dallas City News

McCarthy: Cowboys ‘relish’ chance to bounce back from blowout – Todd Archer, ESPN

Mike McCarthy still believes in this roster, ’relishes’ chance to atone.

A day after the most decisive home loss since 1988, Dallas Cowboys coach Mike McCarthy attempted to take a big picture view.

The Cowboys suffered the fourth largest home loss in franchise history in Sunday’s 47-9 defeat against the Detroit Lions to fall to 3-3 overall. The decisiveness of the loss and how poorly the Cowboys played could be enough to affect the mental state of the team, but McCarthy still believes in the roster.

“At the end of the day if we totally don’t believe it’s about us, it’ll always be about us and play to who we are, what we do, how we do it, then we’re not going to get to where we want to go,” McCarthy said. “And I believe we will. I think this is an opportunity that we relish. I know I relish it. And I think they do too.

“So this is a place that a lot of good can come out of it. Been here before. And I think this is a really good opportunity for our leadership. I think it’s an excellent opportunity for our young guys to continue to play. It’s an excellent opportunity for those guys to build off some of the things they have done well. Because this will pay forward. In my experience it always has. When you play young players this much and play this many different players this much, I think the long game definitely has a chance to be very bright.”

Why coaching decisions are the Cowboys’ biggest red flags from loss to Lions – LP Cruz, Blogging The Boys

Mike McCarthy’s plans this season haven’t been working out.

Per Mina Kimes, Dak Prescott had the highest tight-window rate in 2022. Fast forward to this season, and it’s been a theme all season that the Cowboys’ offense is littered with tight-window throws that force Prescott to place the ball in risky situations. Some of that can be attributed to the need for more talent in wide receivers. Still, the coaches can do more to alleviate that for Prescott. Take Detroit for a direct model in juxtaposition.

Watching how the Lions’ offense operates with creativity, pre-snap motion, and isolating receivers in mismatches, only magnifies the Cowboys need for easier situations to move the ball. At one point, Amon-Ra St. Brown had to be covered by linebacker DeMarvion Overshown after Detroit cleared out their receivers, which afforded St. Brown a clear path across the field. Dallas must incorporate more misdirection or even pick plays to get the players open. Since they don’t do this anywhere as much as they should, the Cowboys are forced to play methodically and nearly perfectly on every down to avoid a third and long.

Meanwhile, Detroit unveiled the playbook that seemed almost a personal vendetta for the Cowboys’ controversial win against them last season. The Lions featured their offensive linemen in two of their three trick plays despite having a substantial lead on the Cowboys. In short, the Lions were having more fun than the Cowboys, and it showed thanks to their play-caller/play-designer alleviating the burden off their respective star quarterback and receiver versus Dallas thrusting everything at Prescott and CeeDee Lamb and expecting them to fly the team out of an early tailspin. The same accusations that head coach Mike McCarthy had been under fire for in Green Bay are starting to emerge with Dallas. You know the ones: Stale, unimaginative, bland. You can use the exact synonyms to describe the Cowboy’s broken offense. Now, if you want to underline that the offense has personnel problems, we agree.

However, what cannot be understood is utilizing Ezekiel Elliott as much as he was after Rico Dowdle’s game last week against the Pittsburgh Steelers. Elliott did admit to reporters his frustration with his lack of participation in the offense. Yet, his getting a prominent role on the offense’s second series of the game didn’t help. Elliott carried the ball four times for six yards (1.5 yards per attempt) on that drive. His last carry on that drive went for one yard and put Dallas in second and long, where they threw a red zone interception two plays later. The offense doesn’t have many playmakers, but catering meaningful carries to a player, a shell of his former self, falls on both the coaches and the player.

Bill Belichick speculation runs rampant after Cowboys’ historic loss vs. Lions – Jerry Trotta, The Landry Hat

With an extra week to process the worst loss of the Jerry Jones era in Dallas, everything and anything is on the table for the 3-3 Cowboys.

Former Patriots head coach Bill Belichick is likely to top many lists and the speculation started no more than two hours after Sunday’s loss.

According to FOX Sports’ Jordan Schultz, Belichick is widely viewed around the league as the frontrunner to land the Cowboys’ job if they make a coaching change after the season. Schultz spoke to multiple sources who affirm that Belichick has a “great relationship” with the Jones family.

This isn’t “new” information, but it’s notable nonetheless.

Belichick was considered a prime candidate for the Cowboys’ job last offseason following the blowout playoff loss to the Packers. It felt inevitable that McCarthy would be fired, but Jones made the stunning decision to bring the HC back for the final year of his contract.

Fortunately for Jones, Belichick was not hired during the 2024 coaching carousel. The six-time Super Bowl champion secured a second interview with the Atlanta Falcons, but they chose to hire then-Los Angeles Rams defensive coordinator Raheem Morris instead.

The case for Cowboys keeping Mike McCarthy the rest of 2024 – Reid Hanson, The Cowboys Wire

Is it possible things could get even worse if an interim coach replaces McCarthy this season?

The Cowboys would likely have to pull from outside the franchise and what coach in his right mind would want to step into this mess in the midseason? The Cowboys still have a first-place schedule to deal with, they still have injuries to overcome, and they still have a talent issue at all key offensive playmaker spots. Bill Belichick has better things to do and that is literally anything.

Next, it’s the reputation issue. One of the best qualities of Jerry Jones is his patience with his coaching staff. He had plenty of cause to fire McCarthy following the 2022 season, but he didn’t. He had all the reasons in the world to fire McCarthy following the 2023 season, but he didn’t. He allowed McCarthy to play out the term of his deal and that’s very attractive to a good head coaching candidate wanting to build a program.

Firing McCarthy would unravel that reputation for Jones removing one of the most attractive traits America’s Team has to offer.

The time to fire McCarthy was over the offseason. The Cowboys knew what they had in their head coach then and had options to replace him available to them. They made their bed and now they have to lie in it.

Cowboys’ running game takes step backwards vs. Lions – Tommy Yarrish, DallasCowboys.com

The Cowboys not being able to build on a positive rushing performance from the week before was one of the biggest disappointments in the loss versus the Lions.

“I think that we got to take a look at what we’re doing run blocking first,” head coach Mike McCarthy said after the game. “I don’t think we gave those guys clean looks today.”

The Cowboys switched up their starting group on the offensive line, moving Tyler Smith to left tackle and T.J. Bass to left guard, removing rookie Tyler Guyton from his starting position at left tackle. It was this same group that finished out the game in Pittsburgh after Guyton left the game with an injury, and it may still be lingering.

“Tyler Guyton is not 100 percent,” McCarthy said when asked about his decision to start Smith at left tackle. “I think if you saw there at the end we went to Asim Richards over him. So that’s just kind of where he is medically.”

Even when the Cowboys get their many key contributors back healthy, it won’t mean anything if there’s still an absence in the run game. Against Detroit, part of the issue was not relying on it enough. The Cowboys ran the ball just eight times in the first half for 14 yards, good for 1.8 yards per carry. That led to Dak Prescott having to throw the ball 20 times, completing 11 passes for 115 yards and an interception.

“It doesn’t help when you get down in a game, obviously. And you see the other offense rolling as they are,” Prescott said. “It’s a good time for the bye week and for us to figure that out, honestly.”

NFL History: Cowboys enter the record books for the wrong reason – Shane Taylor, Inside The Star

The Cowboys are a team without direction right now.

What Does This Team Do Well?

Regardless of the injuries, what does this team do well? They can’t block, they can’t stop the run, nobody outside of CeeDee Lamb can get open.

Somehow, they are 3-3, and honestly, the winner of the NFC East might win 9 games, and that is being generous.

Everyone on this team has had “moments,” and in the National Football League, you aren’t going to win with moments, you have to show up and be good every single week.

Nobody does that on this team!

They say you are what your record says you are, but they are lucky to even be .500!

On 17 1st downplays, McCarthy called a run on 10 of those plays, but only averaged 1.1 yards per carry on those rushes. Constantly putting Dak and the offense on 2nd & 9 down and distance isn’t a recipe for success.

After establishing pre-snap motion and even orbit motion against the Steelers, all of a sudden McCarthy forgot how successful it was, and went back to a static formation on 90% of offensive plays.

CeeDee Lamb: Cowboys will be fine, bye week will help – Michael Smith, Pro Football Talk

Cowboys WR1 discusses the bye and moving forward.

“The bye week most definitely will help,” Lamb said, via the team’s website. “And things that we’ve missed on are very small things, and I know I say that every week or that we’ll be fine, but I know we will. Again, we just got to capitalize on the small mistakes. We’ve got to score. We’ve got to score touchdowns in the red zone. We’ve got to capitalize and continue moving the ball. I feel like there’s some good also, but there’s a lot more bad areas and we know we’ve got to fix that.”

Lamb said a 3-3 start is no time to panic.

“The season doesn’t end in six weeks, I’ll say that,” Lamb added. “This bye week, we’ve got to use it to be better.”

The Cowboys could hardly be worse than they were on Sunday against the Lions.