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Mike McCarthy Disagrees With Dak Prescott's Claims About Coach's Influence on Cowboys

The head coach curiously disagreed with a public display of support from his franchise quarterback.

Josh Wilson

McCarthy and Prescott during a Cowboys game
McCarthy and Prescott during a Cowboys game / Kyle Terada-Imagn Images
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It's been a trying year for the Dallas Cowboys, and in turn, for head coach Mike McCarthy and quarterback Dak Prescott. The latter of the two has seen his playing season come to an end after suffering a hamstring injury in early November.

Dallas is still mathematically alive in the playoff race with a measly 2% chance of making it according to the NFL, but it would take a number of variables falling their way to qualify for the postseason. At this point, most of the focus is shifting toward next year.

Asked to look ahead to next season and whether or not Dallas has everything it needs to win, Prescott said he believed in his coach, "wholeheartedly,"

"[He deserves a chance] to coach this team, I guess you could say more influence, on his terms, may be a good way to say it. The guy has won a Super Bowl, I know Jerry [Jones] has attested to that." 

Asked for his take on the topic, McCarthy denied the need for more influence, saying he wasn't sure what Prescott meant. He indicated he had more input in Dallas than he ever had in Green Bay, where he coached for 13 seasons, winning one Super Bowl.

A curious lack of alignment on a topic one would think would be easy for the pair to agree on.

Looking purely at results, it looks like it could be an offseason necessitating change for the Cowboys at head coach. But with Prescott's emphatic support, perhaps it encourages owner and general manager Jerry Jones to run things back for one more season under the current makeup.

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Josh Wilson
JOSH WILSON

Josh Wilson is the news director of the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated. Before joining SI in 2024, he worked for FanSided in a variety of roles, most recently as senior managing editor of the brand’s flagship site. He has also served as a general manager of Sportscasting, the sports arm of a start-up sports media company, where he oversaw the site’s editorial and business strategy. Wilson has a bachelor’s degree in mass communications from SUNY Cortland and a master’s in accountancy from the Gies College of Business at the University of Illinois. He loves a good nonfiction book and enjoys learning and practicing Polish. Wilson lives in Chicago but was raised in upstate New York. He spent most of his life in the Northeast and briefly lived in Poland, where he ate an unhealthy amount of pastries for six months.

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