Why you should like Mike McCarthy’s Dallas Cowboys staff that has added George Edwards
The Dallas Cowboys are adding George Edwards to Mike McCarthy’s new staff to a role that has yet to be completely defined.
Edwards will work with the linebacker but his role will be larger than that, according to sources.
And that’s understandable considering Edward’s experience. He comes to the Cowboys after serving as the Minnesota Vikings defensive coordinator from 2014-2019.
Edwards also has experience as the defensive coordinator with the Washington Redskins and Buffalo Bills and this is now his second stint with the Cowboys, as he was their linebackers coach from 1998-2001.
Linebackers is his area of expertise and combined with Scott McCurley, who was previously hired to coach linebackers, the Cowboys have upgraded the teaching at the position from the-departed Ben Bloom.
More importantly, Edwards adds more experience and coaching expertise to a McCarthy staff that is deep in skins on the wall but also has some familiarity and youthful enthusiasm to connect with the players.
“I think when you put together a staff, I think you look at it from my personal perspective of what I’m trying to build, but also I think you have to recognize the staff that the players were working with in the past,” McCarthy said recently when asked about his staff. “You had a lot of young coaches on offense. Experience was something I valued. So that’s a priority of mine when I’m establishing what we’re trying to do as a coaching staff, the personalities.”
In addition to Edwards and McCurley, the Cowboys coaching staff now features: defensive coordinator Mike Nolan, special-teams coach John Fassel, offensive coordinator Kellen Moore, quarterback coach Doug Nussmeier, defensive line coach Jim Tomsula, assistant defensive line coach Leon Lett, offensive-line coach Joe Philbin, running backs coach Skip Peete, receivers coach Adam Henry, tight ends coach Lunda Wells, secondary coach Maurice Linguist, assistant secondary coach Al Harris and assistant offensive line coach Jeff Blasko.
While Edwards is an established former defensive coordinator, Nolan, Philbin, Tomsula and Fassel all have been head coaches.
“There’s a certain personality that I was looking for with these staff members, how they fit together,” McCarthy said. “That’s why I think it’s important to hire the coordinators first and make sure that those assistants clearly understand that there’s a chain of command and it fits together. Experience was definitely a primary component that I was looking for.”
Peete is a veteran running backs coach who is in his second stint with the Cowboys. Henry, Wells, Lundquist and Harris are all young rising coaches.
Lett, Moore and Nussmeier have familiarity with the current roster.
And Nolan, McCurley, Tomsula, Blasko and Philbin have previous connections with McCarthy from past stints in Green Bay and San Francisco.
“I think it goes to the personality type that you’re looking for,” McCarthy said when asked about prior relationships with his coaches. “I think it’s important to have individuals that are the same guys every day. This is going to shock you but I’m not expecting it to be smooth sailing all the way through. We just have to make sure we have the right people that handle those adversity times because at the end of the day everything we do is about the locker room. Just looking for consistent personalities and obviously, the best evaluation of that is if you do have former experience.”
This story was originally published January 24, 2020 at 12:05 PM.
