Dallas Cowboys: Can Mike McCarthy and staff control this team?

The Dallas Cowboys are naturally a dysfunctional organization. With an overly involved owner and no clear chain of command in place, players have an open door to the owner/president/general manager and have been known in the past to go “over the head” of their respective coaches.

It’s safe to say any coach coming to Dallas is going to face a difficult situation because they need to walk a unique line between players and management. That’s why most alpha-coaches pass on the job here. Anyone who’s ever spent time in middle-management can see this is a pretty rough situation for a coach to be in.

The Dallas Cowboys need Mike McCarthy and staff to get this team disciplined in their play

So it should be no surprise the Dallas Cowboys currently look “undisciplined”. Miscues and mental errors have been running rampant this preseason. Just in the last preseason game we saw four devastating 3rd down penalties that extended drives.

Extending drives is the last thing this Dallas Cowboys defense can afford to do. Coming off one of the worst defensive years in Cowboys history, the defense will be lucky to just reach “average” status here in 2021, let alone be good.

Clearly this is the time of year for mistakes. Over half the players on the current roster will be cut in the next month and Dallas in particular is installing a new defense under Dan Quinn. But we can’t just let that excuse everything either. Last year was one of the most undisciplined teams we’ve ever seen, after all. They have a long way to go.

The Dallas Cowboys need to get a handle on this now because it speaks to an even bigger problem down the stretch – discipline and accountability.

Something that Mike McCarthy was scrutinized for in Green Bay was his eagerness to delegate and willingness to being hands-off. That may work for a smart veteran team but not for the Cowboys.

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The Cowboys are young and chronically undisciplined. If shooting yourself in the foot was an Olympic sport, Dallas would be gold medalist. Mike McCarthy and staff need to instill a little fear in the more impressionable players on the roster. Setting a high standard is something that has to be done early and frankly something we as fans haven’t seen around here since Bill Parcells.

You can say you’re playing for a Super Bowl but until you start acting intolerant for anything other than greatness, those are just words. The NFL is a league of grown men and they should be treated as such. But that doesn’t mean we need to have “camp cupcake” either.

Besides a healthy roster, the best thing that we can accomplish in the preseason is discipline and accountability. It may not fill up stat sheets but it pays dividends down the stretch.

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Does this look like a disciplined team to you?

• Published on 08/16/2021 at 20:01 PM
• Last updated at 08/16/2021 at 17:08 PM