McCarthy: More Hands-On; Cowboys: More Hand-Offs?

Tony Pollard is franchise tagged and back. Former offensive coordinator Kellen Moore is gone to the Los Angeles Chargers. And, as he reiterated at last week's NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis, Mike McCarthy is as committed as ever to running the football.

But does a Dallas Cowboys team that in 2022 was sixth in rushing attempts, eighth in yards and second behind only the Philadelphia Eagles with 24 touchdowns on the ground really have a running-game problem? Last season Pollard (1,007) and Ezekiel Elliott (876) were the closest duo in franchise history to producing two 1,000-yard runners in the same backfield.

Nonetheless, in explaining his "philosophical differences" with Moore and his looming hands-on, hand-off approach to 2023, McCarthy blamed his team's ground game.

"We killed our defense," McCarthy reasoned. "We didn't have enough pass rush. And then we got into the playoffs, and we got into a shootout, and we got our ass kicked ... Kellen wants to light the scoreboard up, but I want him to run the damn ball so I can rest my defense."

Shootout you say? "Killed" you claim? The Cowboys lost to the 49ers in San Francisco, 19-12.

Funny, because we could've sworn that Dallas' defense played at an elite level for not only that game but for most of last season. If any unit is to blame for the Cowboys' post-season failure the last two seasons it's the offense.

In eight quarters of playoff football against the 49ers, quarterback Dak Prescott engineered only three touchdowns and 29 points. The Cowboys scored only 17 points in the 2022 loss; just 12 - including only two field goals in the game's final 40 minutes - last January.

Feels like McCarthy - following the lead of owner Jerry Jones - is scapegoating Moore and the "killed" defense and sidestepping the root of Dallas' playoff failures: Prescott's amount and timing of interceptions.

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