The Washington Redskins have fired Jay Gruden after an 0-5 start to 2019 and an otherwise unimpressive run as head coach. With Gruden’s exit, you could argue that the Dallas Cowboys’ Jason Garrett now has the hottest seat of any coach in the NFC East.
Consider the competition. Philadelphia’s Doug Pederson won a Super Bowl in 2017 and has kept the team competitive even with Carson Wentz’s injury issues. It will be a while, and would take a lot of failure, before Pederson’s job security is called into question.
Pat Shurmur has not had much success so far with the Giants but also got handed the unenviable task of managing Eli Manning’s decline. Now he’s got Daniel Jones and some new life in New York; the organization is unlikely to bail on Shurmur in the next few years unless something truly disastrous happens.
That leaves Jason Garrett, who went into 2019 with an expiring contract and no sign that the Cowboys want to extend him until they see the final results of the season.
Everything was rosy after the team’s 3-0 start and talk that Dallas was the class of the NFC. Now they’ve dropped two straight after finally facing some legitimate competition, and both losses have come with turnovers, bad penalties, and ugly first-half performances.
The Cowboys have not looked well prepared for two weeks. They’ve dug holes early that they couldn’t get out of after halftime, and overall have looked outclassed despite having more talent on paper than the Saints or Packers.
With only a few years left to see it, Jerry Jones craves a return to the Super Bowl. At some point, you have to ask if Garrett and his staff are the right men for that job.
Barring an epic collapse, it’s unlikely that anything would happen mid-season. The only time that Jerry’s fired a coach during the year was in 2010 with Wade Phillips, and that was because he had his handpicked successor already on staff and ready to take over; one Jason Garrett.
Even if the Cowboys were to fall apart the rest of 2019, is Jerry ready to hand the keys to Kris Richard or even Kellen Moore?
If Dallas continues to struggle then there’s plenty of argument that Moore and Richard are part of the problem. After all, they are arguably more involved in the very strategies and execution issues that have caused these last two losses.
Also, few people expect the Cowboys to continue losing. They should at least get to 4-2 this week with the Jets on the schedule, and it’s hard to say what will happen from there.
The odds that things will get bad enough for Jerry to fire Garrett this season are not high. But it’s also becoming increasingly unlikely that Jason will get a new contract until all the final game is played.
I know some of you will roll your eyes at the idea of Jerry Jones ever turning on his handpicked “puppet,” but the fact that Garrett doesn’t already have a contract extension is a sign of potential change. Make no mistake, the Joneses are as tired of mediocrity as you are.
Clearly, Jason Garrett now has the least job security of the head coaches in the NFC East. For the sake of our favorite team and it’s 2019 success, I hope that changes over the next few months.
