Recent round of NFL news makes Dallas Cowboys look completely unserious amid head coaching search
Do you know what bothers me as someone who covers the Dallas Cowboys for a living? Since the last time they played some meaningful football was arguably in November, I haven't written about stats lately. Who cares about numbers when the team is playing games with little to no meaning?Well, I've got some Cowboys stats […]
Do you know what bothers me as someone who covers the Dallas Cowboys for a living? Since the last time they played some meaningful football was arguably in November, I haven't written about stats lately. Who cares about numbers when the team is playing games with little to no meaning?
Well, I've got some Cowboys stats for you, they're just not about yards and touchdowns, nor about sacks and interceptions. They're about coaching searches.
- Teams with a head coaching vacancy at some point this offseason: 7
- Teams that requested to interview either of the Detroit Lions' coordinators (Ben Johnson or Aaron Glenn: 6
- Teams that requested interviews to both Johnson and Glenn: 4
- Teams that didn't bother to talk to either: 1
- Teams that have requested interviews with 5+ candidates: 6
You can see where this is going, can't you? The Cowboys were the only team in the NFL to not request interviews with Johnson (now the Chicago Bears HC) or Glenn (favored to become the Jets' coach), the top two candidates in the coaching market.
Upon being eliminated from the playoffs, Johnson landed his head coaching gig two days later. Glenn is expected to land the Jets' job on Tuesday, making the Cowboys' search look even more unserious than it already did.
Six of the other six teams with head coaching vacancies interviewed at least one of them. Literally only Dallas passed on trying talking to them. Of the two teams that requested interviews with Glenn only, each has requested interviews with at least eight other candidates, including the Jets, who have requested interviews with 17 additional coaches.
But the Cowboys? They're sitting pretty at four. Of those four, two are familiar faces to the franchise: Kellen Moore (Cowboys OC from 2019-2022) and Brian Schottenheimer (Cowboys OC 2023-2024).
Another is Leslie Frazier, who hasn't been requested for an interview by any other of the NFL teams with HC vacancies and doesn't appear to be a serious candidate for the job.
Here's the thing: This should be perceived as a decision of the utmost importance for the Cowboys. Choosing their future head coach should be considered a serious process. But so far, how can you take them seriously?
This is not what due diligence looks like. The other teams' processes prove that. Two true "outsiders" have been interviewed for the Cowboys job, neither of which are considered among the top head coaching candidates around the NFL (Robert Saleh and Frazier).
In the meantime, fans have heard about Jason Witten potentially joining the staff, long before the Cowboys even chooses the team's future head coach. You got the gig! Oh, by the way Witten is on your staff, good luck! Fans also know Mike McCarthy and most recently John Fassel decided to leave despite the front office's wishes to retain them for at least one more year.
Meanwhile, names such as Kliff Kingsbury, Todd Monken, Joe Brady, Brian Flores, Liam Coen, Pete Carroll, Steve Spagnuolo, and others are popping up on multiple teams' coaching searches.
Not in the Cowboys' though. You see, they do it differently in Dallas.
Nevermind it hasn't worked for almost three decades.
