For the third time in as many years under Mike McCarthy, the Dallas Cowboys have suffered a gut-wrenching loss in the playoffs. This time, the Green Bay Packers were the ones to eliminate the Cowboys, sending them home after the Wild Card round. The goal was to make the NFC Championship game and maybe the Super Bowl but instead, the nearly three-decade drought continued in Dallas.
A lot of fans are at their breaking point, with EVP Stephen Jones admitting they should not have any faith in the franchise moving forward. But former Cowboy legends, specifically Emmitt Smith, are ready for a fresh start. If he were in Jerry Jones’ shoes, Smith would have fired McCarthy after the loss to Green Bay.
“Because I’m not the GM,” Smith said when asked why McCarthy was retained on Thursday in Las Vegas. “To be honest with you, I thought that move would have been made because of how bad it looked.”
McCarthy has built the Cowboys into a consistent winner during the regular season. Three consecutive seasons of 12 wins are rare, last occurring for Dallas during the run in the 1990s that resulted in three championships in four seasons.
But once the playoff lights have come on, they have been too bright. McCarthy has a 1-3 record in the postseason and the three losses have been tough pills to swallow. This year may have been the toughest since Dallas was thought to have a nice path to the NFC Championship game.
Nobody is quite sure why the Cowboys cannot figure it out in the month of January.
“Our team just simply seems to be lost,” Smith said. “I just cannot put my finger on why it looks so, so bad.”
McCarthy has one year left on his contract and the Jones Family has stated they have no intentions of extending him this offseason. One final run could be made, with multiple people, including Jerry Jones, saying the Cowboys will be going “all-in” on winning the Super Bowl in 2024.
Just one more opportunity is there for McCarthy and if he fails, his contract will run out. If Dallas feels like progress was made, maybe there is an extension to come this time next offseason.
Smith has seen enough though, wanting to hit the reset button. A member of the Cowboys’ last Super Bowl-winning team in 1995, Smith has seemingly run out of patience.
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