'Stir the Pot': Jason Garrett Advice to Cowboys Coach Mike McCarthy

"That’s just the world that we live in. The days of Walter Cronkite telling you the news as it is ... Those are long gone. It’s 24-hour news cycles and we’re trying to stir the pot.'' - Jason Garrett.

FRISCO - Jason Garrett finds himself about to sit in an unusual seat. He's the long-time former coach of the Dallas Cowboys, now taking a job with NBC ... with the responsibility in part of analyzing the work of the guy who took his job,  Mike McCarthy.

And "RedBall'' has some advice for his successor as McCarthy enters Year 3 of his time with "America's Team.''

“There’s a lot of people who make their living speculating about things,'' Garrett told Rich Eisen. (Hat-tip Blogging the Boys.) "And digging things up. And stirring things up. That’s just the world that we live in. The days of Walter Cronkite telling you the news as it is ... Those are long gone. It’s 24-hour news cycles and we’re trying to stir the pot.

“I think the biggest thing for any head coach and really for any player in the NFL, is really just focus on yourself and what you need to do to be your best.''

Garrett, who is moving into studio work on NBC's "Sunday Night Football,'' acknowledges that some will view that latter remark as a cliche. But the fact is, he lived what McCarthy is now living, especially at the tail end of his decade in Dallas, with speculation about his firing and his replacement - oftentimes fueled by media people with agendas.

Now along comes McCarthy and talk of "hot seats'' and Sean Payton and defensive coordinator Dan Quinn and stuff that does nothing to help McCarthy's Cowboys succeed. Garrett said the issue is "so true, certainly in a place like Dallas,'' and he talked of how he worked to convince Cowboys players to shut out the white noise.

"This was a theme that we tried to use with all of our players through the years - players getting into 'Twitter wars' and all of this kind of stuff,'' he said. "It’s like, 'Hey, let’s just lock in on what we need to do each day to be our best. And when you’re preaching that message to your team sometimes you’ve got to preach it to yourself.''

For the record, Garrett has a position vibe about McCarthy and his 2022 Cowboys.

"Mike obviously is a fantastic coach, has been for a long time,'' Garrett said. "He understands the importance of (focus). And I think they have a really good team and they obviously have a really good head coach and a lot of good players and they have a chance to be a good team this year.”

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