Will Mike McCarthy and Dak Prescott be with the Cowboys after this NFL season?

The last time the Dallas Cowboys won a Super Bowl was 1996. Since then, they haven’t come close. They were knocked out of the first round playoffs in the last NFL season after losing to the Green Bay Packers , 48-32, on home turf.

Can Dallas turn its fortune around this upcoming NFL season? Or will it be another disappointing result that would lead to a clean house at the end of the season?

On Thursday’s episode of “The Carton Show,” host Craig Carton and Greg Jennings discussed who is to blame for the Cowboys’ shortcomings, arguing that in order for head coach Mike McCarthy to be retained, the Cowboys need to win the next Super Bowl.

“During regular season, there’s lots of success. Division titles, home playoff games, and then January comes along, and it all goes to pot,” Carton said. “I don’t think Mike McCarthy is to blame for it. Mike McCarthy doesn’t throw the football; Mike McCarthy doesn’t misread defenses, the quarterback does. So they are going to make a decision, in my opinion, where they say goodbye to both of them. Mike McCarthy is going to be gone; five years and not a single appearance in an NFC Championship Game or a Super Bowl, obviously, and Dak Prescott, eight years, and not a single appearance in a NFC Championship Game or a Super Bowl. They are going to clean house.”

Carton went further to say that “Dak Prescott is playing his last year as the Cowboys’ starting quarterback.”

Jennings added that Prescott and McCarthy are both to blame for the unsuccessful past couple of seasons.

“[McCarthy] was brought there to actually be the reason why [the Cowboys] got over that hump,” Jennings said. “This is about Dak Prescott too. Dak Prescott is one of those individuals with the Dallas Cowboys where it’s make-or-break. And it’s not even make. I don’t think there is anything he can truly do, outside of an NFC Championship and/or Super Bowl, to where he remains under center with the Dallas Cowboys after this season.”

During Wednesday’s episode of “The Herd,” Colin Cowherd stated that the reason the Cowboys aren’t getting over the hump is not because of McCarthy, but because of Prescott.

“The two biggest brands in the NFL, to me, are the Dallas Cowboys and the Green Bay Packers … I don’t think we can deny that the Cowboys win a lot, and the Packers win every year. They have controversial quarterbacks, they have massive brands,” Cowherd said. “And there is one guy that’s coached both, Mike McCarthy.

“And we don’t like to blame the quarterbacks for losses. We blame Sean McDermott, John Harbaugh. We tend to blame the coaches, not the quarterback. We wear the quarterbacks jerseys, we have them on our fantasy team, so he is good to us.”

Cowherd explained that McCarthy is a good coach who may have made small mistakes here and there, but he shouldn’t shoulder all the blame for the Cowboys’ losses.

“I was thinking about Mike McCarthy. Is he the best coach in the NFL that is considered a mediocre-to-bad coach?” Cowherd said. “In Green Bay he had an eight-year stretch, won a Superbowl, five division titles. And in Dallas, four seasons, 12 wins, three straight years. He has had a top-five scoring offense 10 times, with multiple quarterbacks, the No. 1 offense in the NFL four times, and one of them was with Dak. And he has succeeded at a high level with three different quarterbacks.

“[McCarthy] has won the big game. The only time Aaron Rodgers won the big game was with Mike McCarthy.”

McCarthy has won 11 playoff games, placing him in the company of many other high-caliber coaches — John Harbaugh has won 12, Mike Holmgren has won 13, Sean Payton has won 9, and Pete Carroll has won 11.

“If you don’t have Brady or Mahomes, that is what your playoff record looks like if you are a great coach,” Cowherd maintained.

Cowboys owner Jerry Jones has continued to express his faith in Prescott, reiterating that Prescott is here to stay with the Cowboys beyond this upcoming season. Jones is also resolute in his belief that the Cowboys will have a successful 2024 NFL season, regardless of the disappointments of the past several seasons in Dallas.

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