Blogging The Boys
What are your expectations for first year head coach Brian Schottenheimer?
The Dallas Cowboys will introduce their tenth head coach in franchise history on Monday, and the fact it will be a promotion for offensive coordinator and lifelong assistant Brian Schottenheimer still feels surreal. So much about how the Cowboys arrived at the decision to make Schottenheimer a first-time head coach has been used as fodder by fans to confirm their worst suspicions about what exactly is holding this team back from competing at the highest level.
Most of this discussion happened before the Eagles and Commanders and Chiefs and Bills played on Sunday to decide which teams will go to New Orleans for Super Bowl LIX, which only added more obvious points of comparison from the winning teams looking so much more dynamic than the Cowboys at any point in their 7-10 season. “Dynamic” and “Brian Schottenheimer’ don’t exactly feel like words that will be put together much moving forward either, meaning the Cowboys already-maligned front office will face one of their toughest sell jobs yet convincing followers the team is going in the right direction under his new guidance.
Schottenheimer will begin in 2025 in the first year of a four-year deal, knowing both of his past successors were able to play out their full contracts as head coach of America’s Team. This contract also aligns perfectly with the remaining years on franchise quarterback Dak Prescott’s deal. Dallas fell hours short of keeping a full reset within the plausible consequences of a poor 2024 season by having both HC Mike McCarthy and Prescott on expiring deals, but extended Prescott while letting McCarthy coach out his deal. In an unfortunately very limited sample size, the Cowboys did not get to see McCarthy call plays for Prescott past week nine. Winning three of his eight starts before being lost for the season in a road game at the Atlanta Falcons, Prescott threw eight interceptions, just one off the pace of his nine interceptions in 17 starts from 2023.
Turnovers remained a constant breaking point that zapped any remote chances this poorly constructed team had of repeating as NFC East champions. McCarthy made it a near weekly point to stress the importance of getting this cleaned up, no longer having the Dan Quinn defense on the other side of things to rack up turnovers of their own, but neither his nor OC Schottenheimer’s coaching could achieve this.
Even so, there were strong indications in this coaching cycle that the Cowboys actually wanted McCarthy back on a new deal. Hiring Schottenheimer to be one of the few carryovers from McCarthy’s staff, in the biggest possible chair, seemingly in the name of keeping continuity for Prescott on offense can plausibly be seen as further evidence the Cowboys did, in fact, want to continue on with McCarthy.
In some way, this is also an admittance that an offense which made a living out of forcing their QB to play hero ball and overcome unimaginative...
