It's not hard to see the root of the Dallas Cowboys' struggles. When a team fails to find any meaningful success over the course of three decades, there's only one common denominator: the owner, and specifically, his refusal to pay up for top head coaches.
Jerry Jones has never been one to pay anywhere close to the top of the market for a coach. While Brian Schottenheimer is the current example, Jones' penny-pinching when it comes to head coaches is nothing new.
The owner doesn't seem to see it as a problem, though. In fact, he insists that paying for a top head coach has nothing to do with winning. During a recent appearance on "105.3 The FAN," Jones attempted to shut down any criticism of his spending.
“There is zero correlation (in the NFL) between how much you pay a coach or how many coaches you have as to winning. There is no correlation. And that’s a random sample of years and all 32 teams involved. So put that in your hopper and smoke it.”
Well, I put it in my hopper (I'll admit that I'm not entirely sure what that means), and Jones' claim isn't true.
Jerry Jones' penny-pinching with Brian Schottenheimer has hamstrung Cowboys
It's not clear where Jones got his numbers in the "random sample of years," but when it comes to winning when it matters most, there's a clear discrepancy between the salaries of Super Bowl-winning head coaches and the amount that Jones has paid his head coaches.
The salaries of the head coaches of the last eight Super Bowl-winning teams average about $14.75 million. Not every head coach's salary is public information, so that's a rough estimate. In contrast, Schottenheimer makes $4.5 million per year, under a third of what Super Bowl winners make. That's tied with Zac Taylor of the Cincinnati Bengals for the lowest in the NFL.
It's not like Dallas doesn't have the money for a top head coach, either. This is the most valuable sports franchise in the world we're talking about. Jones could easily shell out a few million dollars more to secure a more enticing candidate.
Jones' refusal to pay the going rate for a top candidate was never more apparent than it was when Schottenheimer was hired. Ben Johnson and Liam Coen were available during that cycle, but Jones opted for an internal promotion who wasn't generating any head-coaching buzz elsewhere.
According to Jane Slater, Jones wasn't willing to come anywhere close to meeting the demands of the top candidates.
I called the agent of a veteran coach to see if Jerry Jones had even picked up the phone and poked around on him during the Schottenheimer hiring cycle and he laughed and said “Jerry won’t pay 13M and up and that’s the starting point”
— Jane Slater (@SlaterNFL) November 3, 2026
It’s well known and well documented just…
We're 25 games into Schottenheimer's tenure, and he's 10-14-1. His struggles shouldn't come as a surprise. He took on a role that he wasn't cut out for, and his shortcomings have been exposed. You get what you pay for, and Jones paid for a below-average head coach.
Cowboys won't turn things around until Jerry Jones changes his mind about paying for head coaches
Jones has already made it clear that he has no intention of firing Schotteheimer in the middle of the season. For better or for worse (it's for worse), the owner still believes in his hand-picked head coach.
But even if Schottenheimer is fired after this season, Cowboys fans have no reason to believe that Jones will hire someone who can do any better.
There should be some interesting candidates available in the upcoming cycle. Anthony Campanile, Brian Flores, and even Mike Tomlin would be intriguing, but if another team is willing to outbid Jones, Dallas will be left with a consolation hire.
If Jones just wants the Cowboys to remain relevant, he can accomplish that without paying at the top of the market. But if he wants to end the Super Bowl drought any time soon, he'll need to change his philosophy. Until he does, Dallas will be stuck in a frustrating cycle of mediocrity.
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