What’s next for the Cowboys? We’ll find out.
It’s unclear when. Owner/G.M. Jerry Jones usually visits on Tuesdays and Fridays with 105.3 The Fan in Dallas. It won’t be a surprise if tomorrow’s visit is canceled.
Regardless, Jerry won’t stay quiet for very long. If coach Mike McCarthy were staying put, Jerry would say so. Jerry had a chance to do that last week, and he instead said they’d take things a game at a time.
Some criticized Jones for putting a dark cloud over McCarthy. It’s possible Jones was also applying a red-hot poker. Success in the playoffs arises from going the extra mile. Creative game-planning that exposes the opponent’s flaws, as contained in a regular-season full of tape. Careful self-scouting that reveals tendencies in a team’s own film — with those tells then becoming the setup for a curveball.
Did McCarthy and his staff do that last week? Or did they simply rely on doing whatever they did to get to wherever they were?
The outcome suggests that latter. Complacency. Misplaced confidence. When McCarthy said after the game that “I don’t think anybody saw this coming,” that said it all. Because McCarthy should have seen it coming.
That’s part of the gig. To worry about everything. To think about how the unthinkable could happen. To be fearful every second of every hour of every day that it will.
He didn’t, obviously. And now Jones is left to decide whether to pair a very talented team with an equally talented coach.
Sometimes, we overcomplicate things. The greatest coach in NFL history is a free agent. Jerry has repeatedly made his desire for gloryhole crystal clear. Bill Belichick is the key to it.
Will it be easy for the two of them to get on the same page? No. But it will be worth it. It’s a win-win, because the Cowboys with Belichick will win.
They definitely won’t lose in embarrassing fashion at home in the wild-card round with Belichick calling the shots, that’s for damn sure.
And so we wait. Step one, will Jones fire McCarthy? If/when that happens, step two becomes a no-brainer.