National Football League

Cowboys at crossroads, but Jerry Jones isn't considering coaching change

Published Oct. 14, 2024 1:29 p.m. ET

Jerry Jones says he isn't considering a coaching change.

There's no question the owner of the Dallas Cowboys has had happier birthdays than his 82nd.

Yet another puzzling blowout loss at home — this one on Jones' birthday — has the Cowboys at a crossroads going into their open week before a visit to San Francisco, where they played dreadfully a year ago.

The bright side for Dallas (3-3) is a 3-0 road record and just a one-game deficit in the division for the defending NFC East champion.

There was no talk of bright sides following a 47-9 loss to Detroit.

It was the worst home loss of the Jones era, which started in 1989, and the worst at AT&T Stadium, which opened in 2009.

The Cowboys had won 16 consecutive games under their retractable roof before the current four-game skid — all lopsided losses — that started with a wild-card stinker against Green Bay last January.

"This was a shocker," Jones said. "So, [I] don’t have a lot of answers. What are you going to do about it? We’re going to go to work."

And that will be under Mike McCarthy, if Jones' immediate reaction to the question of his coach's future doesn't change.

Things got testy when Jones was reminded that he had made one midseason coaching change.

"That would be a hypothetical," Jones shot back. "In that matter, do you think I’m an idiot? Do you? OK. Well, I’m not going to (be) hypothetical with you about would I consider a coaching change in light of the timing we’re sitting here with. I’m not. At all."

To Jones' point, the comparisons aren't close. The billionaire businessman fired Wade Phillips in 2010 when the Cowboys were 1-7 and looked like they had quit the night before in a nationally televised 45-7 loss at Green Bay.

It's easy to question the effort of a team that has been outscored 110-35 combined in the first halves of its past four home games. But quarterback Dak Prescott had strong words of support for his coach.

"I’ll go to war for that guy, with that guy, every single day," Prescott said after throwing two interceptions and finishing with the second-worst passer rating of his career (42.2). "And I’m not the only one in that locker room. I feel like everybody feels that. I know he said it to you guys, he said it in there, he’s looking in the mirror, as we all should."

Reporting by The Associated Press.

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