Cowboys Hire Wade Phillips For Some Reason - Page 2

I cringed at first when the reports were that Norv Turner was the leading candidate. Norv has had his chances, and has proven repeatedly he is far more successful as an offensive coordinator than a head coach (a head coach who insists on doing the offensive play-calling, at that).

Wade is the same thing, just on the other side of the ball. He is a great defensive coach, as his track record proves, but he just doesn't work as a head coach, for whatever reason.

The Cowboys also interviewed a couple ex-Bears, Mike Singletary and Ron Rivera, both of whom I think would have been a better fit. They even interviewed 12-year Cowboy backup QB Jason Garrett (and then hired him before they hired Phillips, but didn't name him as offensive coordinator until later. We-i-rd).

Okay. They hired Phillips because he's laidback and Parcells was too serious. I'll be nice and give them that one.

They hired Phillips because he has proven success with the 3-4 defensive alignment, which Parcells has very successfully drafted the talent for. Just one flaw there... in the six seasons since Phillips last coached, he served as San Diego's defensive coordinator.  His defense only ranked in the top 10 twice ('01 and '06), and his teams were always the same — great run defense, swiss cheese secondary (ranked in the bottom 10 four times). What was one of Dallas' biggest problems last season? A porous secondary! They finished 24th in the league, giving up an average of 219 passing yards per game.

Phillips' track record shows he is very unlikely to change that trend, and with it, unlikely to change Dallas' fortunes.

Jerry Jones got so emotional he cried at the press conference, but it was probably just a show. Jerry loves hiring hometown boys (Jimmy Johnson and Barry Switzer both played with him at Arkansas, and Phillips is from Houtson), and is a lot like Al Davis - he makes whatever decisions he feels like, everyone else be damned. Well, Jerry, enjoy the fruits of your labor, which will probably be a few more 9-7 seasons before you fire Wade and promote Jason Garrett to head ball coach.

Article Author: Geeves

Geeves is mainly a critic of the sports and entertainment arena, recently shifting his time and resources away from his own middling blogs and into the Blogcritics realm at something resembling full time.

Visit Geeves's author page