Jerry Jones puts Mike McCarthy on last-minute notice with Belichick comments

Mike McCarthy might be a good coach. Heck, he might even be a great coach. After all, no matter how the remainder of his career goes, he has a Super Bowl title on his CV, and no one can take that away from him, and not that many coaches have even accomplished that much.

Even with the Cowboys, his current team, his overall record is good: 42-25. But playoff success eluding him (he has notched one playoff victory since taking over his current role in 2020) leading a highly talented set of Cowboys teams has put him firmly on the hot seat the last several years.

Worst of all is the excuses are hard to conjure up for him. He's repeatedly struggled to accomplish crucial head coaching duties like clock management when the pressure is on.

Well, that pressure just got even more intense with Jerry Jones' recent comments on a possible future head coaching candidate.

Jerry Jones leaves a door wide open for Bill Belichick to coach the Cowboys

After a hugely disappointing Wild Card Round exit from the NFL Playoffs this year at the hands of the underdog Green Bay Packers, many thought McCarthy was a shoo-in to get the pink slip. Instead, the Cowboys decided McCarthy deserved another year and another shot, despite a complete lack of confidence from most of the fanbase that he'll be able to right his wrongs in a meaningful way next year.

That was a shock considering the sudden candidacy of Bill Belichick, longtime decorated head coach of the New England Patriots, who mutually agreed to part ways with the team he had coached since 2000.

Recently, team owner and general manager Jerry Jones had this to say about Belichick, H/T Jori Epstein of Yahoo! Sports:

“I know him personally and I like him,” Jones said. “There’s no doubt in my mind we could work together. None. None.”

Before he said this, he did some bouncing around, making a few statements that were outright refusals of talking about coaching candidates, effusively stating that McCarthy is their guy.

“I don’t want to get into, for reasons of talking about anybody that I may have talked to that’s been bantered around about coaching,” the Dallas Cowboys team owner and general manager said Tuesday. “But I didn’t talk to anybody. I haven’t talked to anybody that is a head-coaching candidate other than my own.”

Yet, Jones couldn't help but twist the knife a little bit and let it be known that there's a world in which he does see it possible for this team to be coached by someone other than McCarthy.

Notably, Jones does not necessarily suggest Belichick would work with Jones in a head coaching capacity. It seems openings this round may pass Belichick by, and perhaps there's some fantasizing in Jones's mind about him joining the team as a consultant or front office executive while he waits out the coaching market.

Then again, everyone knows where Belichick has a chance to be most effective: On the sidelines.

Editor's Note: A previous version of this article mistakenly said the Cowboys were defeated in the 2023-24 playoffs by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.