IMAGINE DEION COACHING THE COWBOYS AND SEIZING HIS STAR FROM THE LOGO
Sanders would take over NFL hype while challenging his players and Jerry Jones — while the Bears interview Mike McCarthy (why?) — but like recent Dallas head coaches, he’ll struggle to win glory
Please give him a counterfeit championship ring. If the madcap whirl at this stage of Jerry Jones’ churn is hiring the best showman, laugh away — no asteroid in the Dallas orb would be larger than Deion Sanders. Players would fade into sheep. Jerry would decolor at 83. Even the Star at midfield would evaporate in the neon of Deion, who was created to coach the circus and might find better ways to reinvent cheerleaders.
But would he win, cradling more attention than any sideline leader in sports?
He might lose beyond belief, actually, as the Cowboys have done for three decades.
Mike McCarthy wasn’t gone for a burp Monday — with Chicago in his sights, heaven helping Bears fans — when Jones contacted Sanders. So much for his Colorado claims that he won’t coach in the NFL without a roster buildup from his sons, including Shedeur, the quarterback. So much for Tom Brady rejecting him in Las Vegas, where Sanders was showing interest. Because there oh there was Jones, with his 80,000-seat stadium and a planet filled with religious fans, discussing a gig where McCarthy, Jason Garrett, Wade Phillips, Bill Parcells, Dave Campo, Chan Gailey — and, of course, Jones as a bogus boss — have failed since Jimmy Johnson and Barry Switzer won three Super Bowls in the ‘90s.
All it will take is a contract in the $100 million range. Do you think Sanders, with an ego larger than the Rocky Mountains, will stay with the Buffaloes on a $29.5 million deal and turn down the Cowboys? Thankfully, I am not Jones, but if I was, the focus would be on a gifted offensive playcaller such as Ben Johnson in an attempt to finally win. Wouldn’t the Detroit muse rather have Dak Prescott, if healthy, and receiver CeeDee Lamb? And a defensive monster in Micah Parsons? Who wants Caleb Williams when he must improve substantially? Who wants Trevor Lawrence in Jacksonville when his arrow is pointed backwards? Even if Shedeur ends up in Vegas, the Cowboys seem on another plane for Johnson than Management Man Brady.
Yet Jones also might jump on another express train. Sanders continues to gain max national hype for his work in Boulder, where he improved to 9-4 last year and contended for the 12-team College Football Playoff. As the original two-way athlete — the NFL and Major League Baseball — he ushered Travis Hunter into a Heisman Trophy celebration. He remains an American master crafter based on his braggadocio, placing him ahead of the rest even when his team stumbles. Jerry is pursuing the Deion hum and buzz.
“To hear from Jerry Jones is truly delightful, and it's intriguing," Sanders told ESPN. “I love Jerry and believe in Jerry. After you hang up and process it, and think about it, it's intriguing. But I love Boulder and everything there is about our team, the coaches, our student body and the community.”
As for McCarthy, he has been fired by the Cowboys and Packers and is looking to the Bears and Saints for another gig. He might be too far gone in his career to help Williams in Chicago. Brett Favre is among those insisting otherwise, saying, “Mike has done a great job of developing young quarterbacks. So, if you’re looking at it from that perspective, yeah, he’s a perfect fit.” Favre and Aaron Rodgers, right? The take is straight up George McCaskey’s alley and does establish a long NFL career in front of Marcus Freeman, who isn’t ready to leave Notre Dame, and make McCarthy available immediately as opposed to Johnson and Todd Monken, who might have a Super Bowl ahead of them.
At 57, Sanders can’t dismiss the Cowboys and keep gathering more pro offers in future years. Shedeur is off to the NFL and Shilo would like to join him. Deion sells the flatirons and the Colorado party and recruited Julian Lewis to play quarterback. Isn’t he ready for the next level, even if the next level isn’t ready for him? “Kids want to come play for him. And he has a way of selling that,” Jones said. “That is one skill, that recruiting skill, that is not a huge prerequisite for NFL coaches.”
But he’d also market himself as the fulcrum of the world’s most valuable sports team. Players are fascinated by him. Fans would stare and stammer. McCarthy could join the Bears. Johnson could join the Jaguars. Mike Vrabel will turn around the Patriots. Deion would dominate the league — and if Shedeur is off to the Raiders, Shilo will be available as a lower-round draft choice. Months ago, Sanders suggested he could dictate where Shedeur plays just as Eli Manning determined he would play in New York. “It’s certain cities that ain’t going to happen. It’s going to be an Eli,” he said.
That won’t happen in Dallas, for now, when the Giants are a division rival and Prescott is returning. The kickstand, as he called it, is horizontal and not in use. Recently he said otherwise, which he tends to do. “I’ve got a kickstand down. You know what a kickstand is? ... That means I'm resting,’’ he said. “I’m good, I'm happy, I'm excited. I'm enthusiastic about where I am. I love Colorado. I love my Buffaloes. I love everything we’re building. I love everything we’re doing and I love Boulder, Colorado. I do.”
In mid-January of 2025, after Jones called and asked about a vacancy that fits, it turns out he’s a mountainous fan of Dallas, Texas. It’s time, he says online, “to just be a coach and not be a dad.”
He won’t win glory. We’re ready to watch, anyway.
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Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.