Dallas Cowboys making one thing clear in Schottenheimer era: They will ‘run the damn ball’
Talking to reporters at the 2023 NFL Scouting Combine, then-head coach Mike McCarthy was asked about taking over play-calling duties going into that season and how his philosophies would manifest onto the field.
“I want to run the damn ball so I can rest my defense,” McCarthy said in his answer.
While his comments were later back-tracked in either the spirit of competition or truly because he misspoke, there was still an expectation going into McCarthy’s time as a play-caller that an emphasis would be put on running the football.
However, two seasons later and only hindsight to refer to with McCarthy no longer with the Dallas Cowboys, that didn’t quite manifest how we all expected. In 2023, the Cowboys ran the ball on 40.7-percent of offensive plays (22nd in the NFL) and in 2024, the run play rate dropped to 38.8-percent (27th in the NFL). The production dropped with it, as the team failed to eclipse 2,000 team rushing yards in back-to-back seasons for the first time since 2012-13.
Now as Brian Schottenheimer prepares to take over as head coach and lead play-caller, there is an early emphasis being shown on marrying his already-established pass concepts with an offensive coordinator with a knack for getting ball-carriers out in space in the run game.
“The key this day and time is to marry that run game to the pass game and Coach Schottenheimer is all over that,” Cowboys executive vice president Stephen Jones said this week at the Senior Bowl. “He wants to find a guy who’s going to be able to marry his philosophies to the run game. We want to be able to run the ball. Everybody says that we want to run the ball and we want to stop the run, and certainly that’s what we want to do.”
“That’s what great championship football teams do, and I know Coach Schottenheimer wants to do that. I think it’s real important that we find in this [offensive coordinator] hire a coach that’s going to be outstanding in the run game area.”
On Friday, the Cowboys welcomed Arizona Cardinals offensive line coach Klayton Adams for an in-person interview after impressing the front office in a virtual interview earlier in the week. According to reports, he was promptly hired.
In 2024, the Cardinals led the NFL in post-snap pulling with offensive linemen in the run game, as Adams specialized in intricate blocking schemes that allowed for multiple blockers to pave holes for running backs such as veteran James Conner who finished with the highest single-season rushing total (1,094 yards) in his seven-year career.
While at the Senior Bowl in Mobile, Ala., the Cowboys’ scouting department put in a lot of work in interviewing multiple running backs such as UCF’s R.J. Harvey, USC’s Woody Marks and Kansas’ Devin Neal among others. With Rico Dowdle set to hit free agency, Deuce Vaughn is the only running back from the 2024 active roster signed for next season. Drafting one running back, if not two, was already a necessity. With a now clear emphasis on establishing a run game, it’s now become a requirement.
Whether it’s drafting Heisman Trophy runner-up Ashton Jeanty with the No. 12 overall pick or selecting production machines such as Harvey or Neal later on, the need is there for a running weapon in a league where Saquon Barkley and Derrick Henry have powered their teams to deep playoff runs.
Unlike the last two years, the Cowboys are showing that they do, in fact, want to now “run the damn ball” under Schottenheimer and his impending offensive coordinator hire. With the right hire and weapons in place to do that, it will only make life easier for Dak Prescott and the beginning of the Schottenheimer era.