Bold Prediction – Dallas Cowboys

Posted on May 1, 2008 in Recreation and Sports by admin

The Cowboys will have the best season of Wade Phillips’ tenure in 2007, but he will coach in Dallas for no more than three years, after which the team will need to rebuild from the ground up. That’s if Wade Phillips’ past performance as a head coach is any indication of things to come.

Prior to being named head coach of the Cowboys, Phillips’ career record shows 45 wins and 35 losses in seasons when he was in charge for the full season, a 0.563 career winning percentage. (Because interim coaching records are rarely true reflections on a coach’s ability, I’m discounting his teams’ partial-season wins and losses (3-4) in New Orleans in ’85 and Atlanta in ’03.) In itself, this isn’t horrible, but it certainly isn’t like Phillips is knocking on the door to the Hall of Fame. Unless he just wants to get in early before the crowds get too big.

In his five full-seasons as a head coach with the Broncos (93-94) and Bills (98-2000), Phillips’ teams peaked in his first season with each team. This indicates that Phillips is probably not a great judge of future potential because he wasn’t reloading his teams with good, fresh talent. It also indicates that his player-friendly attitude is refreshing to teams in the short run, but like a fun-loving parent who fails to discipline the children, proves problematic over the longer term.

The airwaves are already filled with material about how soft the Cowboys’ 2007 training camp has been. For starters, the Cowboys are training in the air-conditioned wonder of the San Antonio AlamoDome. Multiple camp days have had only one two-hour practice session. But a cursory review of 2007 training camps reveals that limited two-a-days is becoming standard throughout the league.

What is less than standard is Phillips apparent policy of allowing players to sit out practices without suffering injury. Uber-diva Terrell Owens missed a couple of practices this week with “sore legs.” Owens’ explanation was that he worked out too hard while on vacation in Mexico just prior to training camp, running on the beach, that sort of thing.

Whereas Bill Parcells might have been too much the rigid taskmaster for this team, Phillips is looking like a doddering pushover thus far (and his press conferences are downright boring in comparison to Parcells’ discussions, which were almost always entertaining, whether it was because Parcells was talking X’s and O’s, or because he was skewering a reporter for another dumb question about T.O.).

Compounding the problem for Phillips and the Cowboys this year is that Phillips is working with two rookie coordinators. Although it is clear that Phillips will be calling the defenses himself, Brian Stewart is in his first season as defensive coordinator. At least Phillips was able to hire his own guy at DC; Jerry Jones hired rookie offensive coordinator Jason “Red” Garrett prior to filling the head coaching vacancy with Phillips. Prior to the Dallas OC job, Garrett spent two years as QB coach under “Little” Nicky Saban in Miami. Readers may recall that the quarterbacking in Miami the past two seasons left something to be desired.

In our mind, a cobbled-together coaching staff led by a head coach who shows far less predilection for disciplining his charges than Uncle Buck is no recipe for success. Despite having above-average talent at several key positions, we predict the Cowboys to fare no better than 9-7 overall in a weak NFC East. It would not be surprising to see Phillips lose this team entirely sometime in November or December and see the Cowboys reel off three or four straight losses to miss the playoffs.

And should that happen, look for Jerry Jones to go Bill Cowher-shopping, ending Wade Phillips’ career as a head coach at a mere six seasons.

Pat Mulry is the founder of http://www.FootballReviewReview.com the leading source for original football analysis and reviews of football analysis written by others.

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