Jason Garrett 2.0? Mike McCarthy needs statement win
It turns out the Dallas Cowboys will not go undefeated in Mike McCarthy's first season.
The '72 Miami Dolphins may have some nervous moments if a team like Kansas City or Baltimore makes a legitimate run at 16-0, but they won't be tuning in to Dallas' regular-season finale against the New York Giants with nervous champagne on ice.
By the way, the early McCarthy mention comes because Sunday night's clunker in Los Angeles has some impatient fans already confusing him with the Giants' new offensive coordinator. After one week, an impatient few have taken to calling Jerry Jones' newest hire Jason Garrett 2.0.
Stuff happens. The Cowboys fell in the opener against a quality opponent, and while it would be easy to point the finger at the officiating crew — for failing to see Jalen Ramsey's Vlade Divac-like flop after Michael Gallup had gotten past him on a go route in crunch time — there were a dozen plays where the Cowboys could have risen up to their talent level but didn't.
McCarthy isn't panicking, of course. When he took over for the fired Mike Sherman in Green Bay in 2006, his Packers lost 26-0 to the Bears in his first game, at home no less, and started that season 1-4. The Packers rallied to go 7-4 down the stretch to salvage a .500 season.
Unlike that team, which was three seasons from winning a Super Bowl after Aaron Rodgers supplanted Brett Favre behind center, the Cowboys are built to win now. They're loaded at the skill positions on offense, and the line, while not the mauling unit it was three ago, is still among the league's best.
Losing tight end Blake Jarwin to a torn ACL hurts a little, but he was the fifth option in the passing game behind Amari Cooper, Gallup, rookie CeeDee Lamb and running back Ezekiel Elliot.
The defense took a hit with the losses of linebackers Leighton Vander Esch (broken collarbone) and Sean Lee (sports hernia surgery), placing increased pressure on Jaylon Smith and the oft-troubled Aldon Smith, who has received more chances to make it in this league than most.
This is where McCarthy will have to call upon the years when he won in Lambeau despite the challenges that cropped up there from time to time. I like that he never pushed back against the hype machine when he arrived, and that he embraced the idea of Dallas winning a Super Bowl instead of hiding behind that “play'em one game at a time” cliche.
The march to .500 starts Sunday at home against the Atlanta Falcons, who have one of the league's most explosive attacks but also a porous secondary that was just Swiss cheesed for four touchdowns by Seattle's Russell Wilson.
It's been 10 years since a Dallas team lost two straight out of the gate, and that was the year Jones replaced head coach Wade Phillips with offensive coordinator Jason Garrett after the team started 1-7.
McCarthy is a patient coach — even though he passed up a chip-shot tying field goal with 11 minutes to go in the game, a gamble that didn't pay off — but he understands the fans' intense desire to quickly put that bad West Coast experience in the rear view.
Sunday presents an opportunity to get people smiling about the Cowboys again.
Super Bowl contenders are supposed to send an early message that the buzz surrounding a would-be title run is real. The Chiefs dominated Houston by two touchdowns. The Ravens rambled past Cleveland and we've already mentioned what the Seahawks did to Atlanta.
If the Cowboys are as good as people like yours truly think they are, those new pass rushers will put Matty Ice in the hot seat and Dak Prescott will light up that secondary for a second straight week.
Matt Ryan is 3-1 in his last four starts against the Cowboys, but this newest version has a better head coach, a quarterback playing for a long-term deal and more offensive weapons than any team south of Arrowhead.
They will show us something in Game 2, right?
“We're closer than you may think we are, but at the end of the day our honeymoon is over,” McCarthy said on Monday. “It's time to win games, and that's our focus.”
It's time to unleash Mike McCarthy 1.0.