National Football League

Cowboys' process to hire Brian Schottenheimer as flawed as their results

Published Jan. 25, 2025 2:11 p.m. ET

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David Helman

NFL Reporter

Strictly speaking, the Dallas Cowboys got their man.

After 10 days of uncertainty and unpredictability, they made it official late Friday evening. They began a new regime by agreeing to terms with the offensive coordinator from the old regime, confirming Brian Schottenheimer as the 10th head coach in franchise history.

At his introductory press conference in the coming days, Cowboys officials with the last name Jones will rave about Schottenheimer's pedigree, his preparation and his readiness for the moment. With that trademark glint in his eye, team owner and general manager Jerry Jones will likely reference Schottenheimer's relationship with Dak Prescott, and how important that is to the Cowboys' success moving forward.

Yes, with very real enthusiasm, the Cowboys will assure their fan base and the NFL world that, after parting ways with Mike McCarthy, they got this hire right.

The question for the rest of us is, why should anyone else believe them?

That's what's left hanging in the air as a bizarre coaching search concludes. The Cowboys were always bound to do things their own way, but this feels different even for them.

That probably should have been obvious from the way this started. Nothing about the end of Mike McCarthy's tenure in Dallas suggested the Cowboys were ready for a lengthy search. After all, during the week they weighed his future, they both blocked him from interviewing with the Chicago Bears and missed their league-mandated window to interview coveted candidates like Lions coordinators Ben Johnson and Aaron Glenn.

So, by the time McCarthy did ride off into the sunset on Jan. 13, the organization was both at least a week behind every other team with an opening, as well as hamstrung by who it could have interviewed.

The Cowboys would likely respond that such things never factored into their equations. This is a different job than most, and that fact was hammered home shortly after McCarthy's departure when Deion Sanders was one of the first names linked to the opening. Sanders, of course, is a highly successful college coach, one of the greatest players in NFL history and a former Cowboy, so the interest was as plausible as it was intriguing.

But that intrigue quickly gave way to a more familiar Cowboys playbook. Their first official call was to Philadelphia Eagles offensive coordinator Kellen Moore, who has a seven-year history in Dallas and a strong relationship with Prescott. When Moore's interview wrapped, in came the former head coaches. Former Jets head coach Robert Saleh interviewed a week ago, while longtime defensive assistant and former Vikings head coach Leslie Frazier interviewed just a few days ago.

That was the extent of the Cowboys' official legwork until Schottenheimer entered the picture — an idea that started as a mere rumor last weekend and gradually crystallized into reality.

That's the extent of it. The Cowboys interviewed two former head coaches who took two combined interviews with other teams — both of those going to Saleh, who spoke with Jacksonville and Las Vegas about their openings. Moore made three candidates. The fourth and final one was Schottenheimer, whose office at the Cowboys' facility is roughly 200 feet and one flight of stairs away from ownership's.

For comparison's sake, the Bears interviewed upward of 15 candidates before landing Johnson. The Jets interviewed as many as 17 candidates before selecting Glenn.

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To be clear, this isn't to say that the number of interviews directly correlates to the quality of hire. Head coaching success stories have come from every angle imaginable in this league. But it does illustrate that the Cowboys were hardly thorough in the search for their next leader.

And it does make you wonder: As the Cowboys get set to begin their 30th season since their last Super Bowl championship, what are the odds? 

Schottenheimer has never been an NFL head coach. He had not been given serious consideration for a head coaching job since 2010, when he was the offensive coordinator of the New York Jets. He did not call plays for the Cowboys in the two seasons he worked under McCarthy; Moore had that job in 2022 before McCarthy himself took over playcalling duties in 2023. Schottenheimer received no interest in any other head coaching vacancies this cycle.

What are the odds the solution to the Cowboys' decades-long problem was sitting two doors down from McCarthy this entire time?

With that glint in his eye, Jerry Jones will suggest that the odds are good. He'll sell hope for the future. A veteran staff is already in the works, as former Bears head coach and longtime Cowboys assistant Matt Eberflus is the early favorite to become Schottenheimer's defensive coordinator.

The Cowboys' vision will be vivid, rest assured. Schottenheimer will have the support of the front office. He'll have capable assistants around him and the full backing of Prescott. To be fair to him, he has his own expertise to lean on. He has coached in the NFL for 23 years, experiencing some success as a playcaller for both the Jets and Seahawks. Perhaps the long wait for this opportunity will have prepared him in just the right way.

Written in just the right way, it starts to become convincing. No doubt that's the Cowboys' hope. With enough grit and teamwork, this could become the NFL's next surprise success story.

That's where we come back into play, because someone must remember that these decisions aren't made in a vacuum. 

The same decision-makers who hired Schottenheimer on Friday night are the ones who have botched five of their past seven coaching hires dating back over 30 years; who have overseen just four playoff wins since that victory in Super Bowl XXX; who have now endured the longest drought without reaching the conference championship game in the entire NFC.

Ultimately, that's the issue at hand: process versus results. 

The hire depends upon the makeup of the coach — his temperament, his leadership, his decision-making, his mind. Perhaps the result will be that Schottenheimer proves himself a better coach than most expect.

Right now, we know the Cowboys' process was neither thorough nor ambitious. It's a process that requires a fair amount of faith that they know better.

Fair or unfair, the main question as we get set for Brian Schottenheimer's tenure in Dallas is simple: Who still trusts the Joneses?

David Helman covers the NFL for FOX Sports and hosts the NFL on FOX podcast. He previously spent nine seasons covering the Cowboys for the team's official website. In 2018, he won a regional Emmy for his role in producing "Dak Prescott: A Family Reunion" about the quarterback's time at Mississippi State. Follow him on Twitter at @davidhelman_.

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