You're listening to the downbeat on ninety seven to one, the freak I'm away,
I'm away, I'm a way down. Should Coach McCarthy be fired if
the Cowboys lose on Sunday? You can call in and weigh in two one
four or eight one seven seven eight seven one n one. Also text in
all day leave talkbacks too. iHeartRadio app red microphone button. It was up
to a thirty second voicemail. We might play those in the nine to thirty
segment coming out in one hour. Jimmy Kimmel against Aaron Rodgers. Kimmel's first
episode of the new year was last night, and he had a lot to
say about Aaron Rodgers calling him a pedophile or making a joke that he would
be on Epstein's list. Uh got the audio for that, the juice behind
all of that ding Good Morning News coming up in thirty minutes. But you
know, Cowboys wild Card weekend definitely a super Wildcard weekend made us want to
create a new segment that Mikey King came up up with that. I love
the Super wild Card pump session. That's right, gemp. We are pumped
up, but there's nothing wrong to get more pumped up, No, man,
And here's the thing, there's basically no limit to how pumped up you
can get. Yeah. I mean there may be some eventual like health concern
with your heart or something like that, but I don't think just being straight
up pumped has really ever led to anything too terrible. So get pumped,
and get pumped today, and then tomorrow more pumped, you know more,
and then bam right on Sunday afternoon. That's hopefully when everybody you know it
peaks and the team peaks. Everything happens and it's good for everyone. Yeah,
go Cowboys, and you start getting pumped again. Cold Front's gonna peak
up as that's happening as well. As the temperatures drop, you get more
excited to warm your body up for the game. Cowboys three point thirty on
Sunday. They want you to wear white if you're going to the game.
Tickets are not gonna be a affordable though. Looking at that weirdly, have
you looked, dude, standing room only stuff and the high triple digits is
it? Yeah, more like more than two fifty just to get in the
damn building. I don't know if it's more than two fifty you said high
triple digits, I think oh oh no, no, i'man like over one
hundred, one hundred and ninety someone. Well, don't say it the way
you said it, then, Okay, Uh the lowest that I have on
SE I got you one eight. If you want to go to the party
pass, okay, but I'm not. You know I'm not. Okay,
Yeah, Kevin hates the party pass when I have a TV. Okay,
don't go on party pass. Let me just say, have you done it?
I did it the first time first game I ever went to there Carolina
Panthers. It maybe be the first game ever or first or second home game
ever. I was like, don't want to see this building, dude,
And you didn't know the party pass was a damn joke. Yeah, and
you can't access the building. No, you can access the building, but
I'm no, I mean the entire stadium. Oh no, no, you
I mean you got standing room only and and you if you want to fight,
the best you're gonna do with the party passes is watch the game on
the side TV of the hanging jumbo tron, which, hey, you know,
I mean you want not affordable to go see this football team play which
is insane for real fans, which is a whole different conversation. But you're
in the building, you're at the game. You can tell your friends that
you get to hear it, you can feel some of the vibe, if
that's worth something to you. But you're gonna be watching it on the side
of the JumboTron unless you get there and run in when they crack the doors
open. We always see that video and then fight for your life up on
the rail. Dallas, Texas TV always posts those Yes, there's always someone
laying on the concrete, like the guy who fell out of the Best Pro
Shop aquarium, motionless, almost getting trampled. I'm done. You can go
way upper ten. Three hundred. No, I'm just watch it on TV
under three hundred. No. No, I know, I know, I
know, we know you're gonna do that. Jesus Kevin, I know play
radio. I know how much is parking for a playoff game? I bet
that's doubled, is it? I bet it's two hundred bucks to park anywhere
near that. I bet, dude, it's already one hundred. Kevin one
hundred. It used to be seventy five inflation. I thought it was seventy
five. What do we pay to go to damn Metallica? I don't know.
It was one hundred dollars, dude. I had a heartburn that day.
I'll say it. I don't like events at AT and T Stadium.
I don't either, Yeah, especially football games. You know, just watch
it. But uh so, here's the coaching scuttle butt so far as yesterday
was Black Monday, I few coaches got fired. The Washington Commanders put in
a formal interview request for one dan Quinn, the LA Chargers with offensive coordinator
Kellen Moore in an interview request for dan Quinn, and the Carolina Panthers with
sharp Teeth and Claws they put in an interview request for dan Quinn. Now,
dan Quinn had a panther to Danny's impressions. Yes, a panther,
do you not? I'll just put surperr on there. Yeah, do your
sir, per Dude. That's up there with treyvon Diggs, Kermit the Frog,
the blue collar, redkneck comedy tour guys in Surper of the many Danny
impressions, as we keep a running list of that buzz see like those are
three? Now, dan Quinn when asked about it in this big David More
article that came out. He's like, the good news for me is I
can compartmentalize the prep you do for head coaching interviews you do in the off
season. And I go, Okay, good answer. Not falling for it,
because when you go interview for a team, you talk about their personnel,
okay, and you have to you have to know what those players are,
which he kind of does. But you know, dan Quinn is a
guy who doesn't take the criticism when the Cowboys give up thirty that Mike McCarthy
does when the Cowboys score twelve. Very interesting thing, and maybe that's just
what goes of being the head coach. My question today is should coach McCarthy
be fired if the Cowboys lose on Sunday? Three straight twelve wins seasons,
three straight playoff appearances? Should or will they answer them? Both? Yeah,
I think I think that's a good way to look at it. I
think no and no. Look, you can usually read tea leaves on these
sorts of things, and take the dan Quinn thing. For instance, if
three teams right now on January ninth are requesting interviews twenty four hours after openings
happen in some of those cases, the tea leaves say that that is a
piping hot commodity that is probably, assuming he wants it, will be a
head coach in the NFL next year, you know. But the opposite side
of that is there's been virtually no talk of firing Mike McCarthy all year.
There really hasn't, except for maybe the beginning of the year when we start
the year and they o Vegas. Oh, does Mike McCarthy is one of
the top coaches to get fired just because that's whatever. There's been nothing so
to go for. I mean, no one's talking about it right now,
we are, but I guess it's more of a hypothetical situation. Yeah,
it would be shocking if a week from yesterday the hot topic is fire Mike
McCarthy. And the only way I think that happens is with a significant defeat
that you can lay on the head coach. I mean, even if they
lose a close game, there's gonna be some of that. But if there's
something egregious that you can say, wow, that's on the head coach,
and they lose by ten or lose convincingly to Green Bay, then I think
it'll be a legitimate conversation, a big one, and Jerry himself will be
looking in the mirror asking these questions. But generally speaking, I think no,
he's not fired, and I think no, he should not get fired.
Agree. I think I said as much yesterday. It's going to have
to a bad decision, a time management decision, something that is kind of
directly his responsibility that leads to their loss. That's the only way that he
should be fired. Will get Would he get fired after a loss under any
circumstance, I don't know, but I'm with you. I agree steady hand.
Three twelve win seasons in a row. Who else is going to do
that? I mean, he's proven he can do it. Yeah, and
I wonder how many you got some damn good personnel. He's got some guys
that are hurt. Is Jimmy Johnson the closest thing to coach fired after three
straight twelve win seasons? I mean maybe I'm missing someone, but around here,
well, yeah, and do we leave you that as fired less?
Yeah? Yeah, that's fair. But we knew what happened there though.
Well Yeah, okay, first of all, I've said this a million times.
I'm not going to lay out the whole whole history. I've seen every
Might Mcarthy game he's ever coached in his life. I'm a lifelong Packers fan.
I know him. I don't have terribly high thoughts of him. I
think he is a good NFL head coach. I do not think he I
think you can do better than him. And I think for the most lucrative
franchise in all of sports, to settle, which I think they did,
is bad, and especially in when there's no salary cap for coaching, I
think it's inexcusable. You should act like the Dodgers are acting and buy everyone.
So I can't handle coaching mistakes from this franchise like I maybe can tolerate
from other franchises who might be a little more, you know, budget constraints
and things like that. Should he be fired if they lose? Probably not,
because I can't be the guy that says odds are you're never gonna win
a championship. If you look at it, fourteen teams make the playoffs,
your odds are not great of winning a Super Bowl. Roll the dice.
Maybe you get it. Okay, so no, but if you do listen
to the Packers. I do think he will be canned. I think for
two reasons. One, he's got a year left on his contract that I
don't think they would mind paying that out. I don't think that's that big
of a deal. Okay, I think he makes a little I think around
ten million dollars. I don't think that's a big deal. And I think
too Jerry, at this stage in his life, is not going to go
backwards, lose to the Packers again, who have caused so many demons for
Jerry at home, okay, and then go backwards. You can't go backwards,
I think neutral. I think if you lost in the division round,
I think Jerry'd be okay, and you'd run it back for his final year
of his contract. But this is a sign that you went backwards, even
though everyone in the world knows you have better talent and a better chance to
win. And I just don't think that is going to work for Jerry.
And I don't think Steven or anyone else who's trying to talk Jerry out of
it would be able to stop that from happening. And I know it's crossed
his mind before, because there was a time when Mike McCarthy thought that he
needed to calm down narratives by going after the offseason two years ago after the
off season, calling up Rich Eisen and saying, Hey, man, I
need to do an interview on your show, and basically kind of went around
the organization a little bit and did his own interview. And I think it
was like, I think they actually kind of looked at that as Okay,
I kind of like the fight. I kind of liked that you did that
and didn't just sit here and take dan quinn narratives and things like that.
By the way, I think Mike McCarthy dan Quinn get along great. But
you can't go backwards and I don't think Jerry's going to allow that. Isn't
part of going backwards though, resetting your head coach and coaching staff, and
I think that's that. And can Jerry afford that amount of time he can
afford to get rid of a three straight twelve win team, back to back
right back to back division? Uh No, Eagles won last year. Yeah,
I think it's nineteen years in a row of new NFC East Division winners.
But that is the name would have to blow you away. Bill Belichick
has a twenty five million dollar deal with the Patriots twenty five million. It's
reset the coaching, you know, market completely, and he's under contract for
next year. He even said in his post Gay Press cover today, I'm
gonna come into work every day like I always do, and he's gonna go
to work until they tell him we don't want you around anymore. And I
don't think Bob Kraft is gonna say that to him unless he knows he can
get Mike Rabel from Tennessee or someone that he likes him wants. I don't
think that's gonna happen. That's the one name I'm gonna read you this little
excerpt from an article I found in The Athletic that was a little interesting to
me. It's a guy named Mike Sando, and he does this thing where
he's got all his buddies in the league, and it's anonymous executives, and
the Athletic article it says from one executive, Belichick to Dallas is my sleeper.
But I'd make Atlanta the odds on favorite for Bill, the Chargers the
odds on favorite for Harball. And there's a big talk that Atlanta wants Bill
Belichick and they do whatever and Arthur Blank's kind of like Jerry got a ton
of money, I'll do whatever. Execs pointed to Dallas as a potential surprise
candidate for an opening if the Cowboys exit the playoffs prematurely. Dallas ranks tied
with Baltimore for fourth in the regular season win rate since McCarthy took over,
But much like Baltimore, McCarthy's one and two in the postseason, John Harball
is not going to be in the hot seat though, you know he's going
to be there forever. Mike Tomlin could go and they make they have a
winning record every single year. But Mike Tomlin could go nine to eight for
ten more years. They're not gonna get rid of him. Yeah, but
you would have said that same thing about Belichick. Okay, nine and eighty
is different than I suppose the records that they've posted recently. You thought Belichick
would be Patriots for life until he decides otherwise. It's it's twenty twenty four,
man, It's not what it used to be. Yeah, I mean,
you can fall out of favor really quickly. But I think there's nine
coaches in the NFL that have won a Super Bowl. We have one of
them, and five of them are still with their same teams, you know,
Harbaugh, McVeigh and Tomlin and Reed and Belichick for now, Pete Carroll.
I mean, McCarthy's the twelfth most tenured coach of the NFL A twenty
twenty. I mean, there's a form of stability there that's good. And
it's what McCarthy and Sean Payton and Doug Peterson that are with different team that
was both with different teams. But I'm just saying, you're like, it's
even when they hired him. It wasn't the sexy high or whatever. I
mean, the dude is a stable rock of winning football for nearly twenty five
years. Look, I'm not even a McCarthy defender, and I get it.
I mean every team, if you watch every play, you're gonna get
go nuts and yell about the head coach and you're already probably yell about the
quarterback. I mean, that's just kind of how it goes. Dude.
Mike McDaniel's seen his boy wonder in this league, and you it drives you
nuts sometimes, I'm sure when you can't get a play into the huddle.
Yes, the players I was reading just yesterday some little article of not even
an article, just someone's thought on Mike McCarthy he's hot seat or Mike McDaniel's
hot seat, and then another article about how the Dolphins like set the bar
of injuries in the NFL this season. Whatever. There's just infinite stuff that
goes in. The only way I think McCarthy gets fired even if they lose
this week is if they just instantly hand the job to dan Quinn, because
then it won't be the massive turnover that I don't think Jerry has the time
and his life calendar to afford. Bringing Belichick in is just like bringing in
parcels where Jerry's suddenly like, wait, I don't get to talk about anything
anymore. Yeah, does this team, this team that's as far as its
personnel goes, and how long they've been together and where Dak is in his
career. Is Belichick the coach that they need? They need a massive,
full on reset. I don't think we're there, no, no, no.
And I think the reason dan Quinn stayed last year, when he was
a pretty hot commodity too, is because there was a lot of winks,
a big old check written, and probably a quiet handshake of when the time
comes all, this can be your Yes, it'd be really easy to just
go, hey McCarthy, dak Micah, ceedee, lamb, run it back.
We're good. Whatever happens this playoff, run run it back. Yes,
it's a very easy thing to do, and it says final year of
his contract, and that's the thing that makes the most sense, and it's
the thing that will likely happen. And they're likely going to beat the Packers
on Sunday, but for the sake of the hypothetical going backwards, they would.
Jerry's cool down process is what you'd have to count on, because I
think in the moment that first seven to ten days after that game, oh
my god, we had two home games. You bring up a really interesting
point if you kind of evolve the topic. I like doing that. Mike
McCarthy might get fired if they lose in the first round, regardless for fear
of losing dan quinn. Yes, because if they bring back McCarthy, Yes,
chances are dan quinn is not going to be your defensive coordinator next year.
Who does Jerry think is more valuable to this team right now? If
you could get in his head and crack it open, would you think that
he thinks Dan Quinn is more, contributes more, and is more essential to
the essential quality of this team. Yeah, what would Dak say? And
that's I don't know. And we always say nothing's as smart or big as
you think it is. That includes the US government or a radio station or
a football team. Jerry's not above exactly. What we started the segment with
was like blaming in his head McCarthy when things go wrong, and conveniently not
really blaming Quinn when things go wrong. Defensively, what if thirty eight thirty
one and that's kind of on the defense, Like, yeah, against the
defense's probably gonna hang twenty eight points on us. Yeah maybe maybe maybe not.
But Packer's off. It's playing really good right now. Again, this
post seventeen pins iNTS of bears though, So I'm not like, no,
I heard that that game flow dictated all that. But caller's wighing in.
You'll get some calls. Oh yeah, let's go to uh the line one.
Who do we got here? Hey? Man? You're live on the
air wayzy? Oh? How you doing? Where you calling from? Man?
I'm going from Dallas. I like Dallas. What's up? Man?
You know what I've been I've been watching these Cowboys and the nineties, man,
and every year it was, Hey, we were on top of the
world for a while, then we got Swisser, we got another title,
and after that it's been trash man. We've had all these coaches. We
had Garrett Man, we went ten years of him going eight and eight,
and every year we still have hope. And every year we're still like,
oh yeah, we're in it. We got this. You know what.
I've gone through so much misery my whole life as a fan, and this
is the year. You know why, We're not gonna fire our coach cause
he's good. We're twelve and four, twelve and five. Man, You
know, every year Garrett didn't do that, Phillips didn't do that for us.
Huh. But what if you lose? I mean, you're a hardcore
cowboy fan. How are you gonna fill seven o'clock on Sunday? You lose?
We're not gonna lose. And if we do, guess what, it's
part for the course. It's happened before. It's happened to me every year
every year we're disappointed, but not this time. You know. You gotta
have faith, man, We gotta have some hope we can dream about,
you know what I mean? One day we can imagine running down down the
Texas, burning cars and flipping things over. Yeah, this guy does remember
the nineties. Punch your horse, let's flip a car if they beat the
Packers This Sunday and I saw McCarthy at the Super Bowl here in Dallas.
I thought it'd be us, but no, guess what he won? It
was, you know, no big deal. It wasn't like I went because
I wanted to see them. I expected the Cowboys to be there, and
guess what they weren't. This had we had some hope. Man, we
got a little more than what we've had before. Every game if one game
at a time, Man, let's win one. Let's get one. Is
he God? Bless you man, thank you for your call. Let's flip
a fee ut Sunday night for it's Super wild Card weekend. Hey, do
you live in North oak Cliff and have like an suv with Cowboys written on
every inch of it? No? I do not sound like my neighbor.
Neighbor there has a giant this is Cowboys country flag and another one has the
SUV that is jacked out with the blue lights. And everything, and it
sounded passionate, like my friend is her? You can go now? Is
he rut balls? Easy? Let's do one more JJ real quick? Who
we got here? Hi? What's your name? This is Cheese? Hey,
Yeah, I'm doing all right, man. I just want to thank
Kat for being the voice of reason. I do love my Dolphins though that's
my AFC team, But Kevin's right. I'm actually of the position that not
only has McCarthy had fire ruble of senses this year, but they could win
the Super Bowl and I would still want him fired because it's Dak who's carrying
this team, and Dak who should be the MVP. As we all know.
Is the reason that it covers up for many of McCarthy's failures. I'm
telling you, Aaron Rodgers covered up so much, thank you. That team
didn't really missed the playoffs and because of just dumb stuff. Yeah, there's
fifty three dudes on a roster and twenty some odd coaches. I mean,
as a team effort, it's not just the quarterback covered for the head coach.
But I can you can't simplify anything like that to anyone. I could
pay whatever to anyone to coach the team. As when you have a quarterback
and people say, oh, Dak sucks, it's kind of the easy question
is okay, well, who you're going to replace him with? I think
with head coaching it's a little bit different, a little bit easier to find
somebody Mike McDaniel style who actually knows how to put people in motion on a
consistent basis. And it's kind of like Ceedee lamb happy to do the season,
everybody's making excuses for oh, well McCarthy's getting back in the groove of
play calling. Well, from day one, you should be getting Ceedee Lamb
the ball. And so when Mike McDaniel is doing his things in Miami and
he's doing a great job, you know, just as far as scheming things,
that's what Mike McCarthy's, in my opinion, the biggest weakness is that
he goes into a game without having stuff like that in place already. It's
amazing that every year, thank you for your call, cheess, appreciate it
that every year, as every year we're gonna ask this question, how do
they lose in the playoffs? And that will somehow dictate what happens. And
that is a small sample size and a bad way to look at things.
But I do think that plays a part. And what's gonna happen here?
Now? You go beat the Packers, you have a home game against the
Lions or the Rams, you know who knows. I mean, this is
your best chance to get to the conference championship game that you'll ever have because
you have two home games and you haven't lost at home this year. So
I think you're in good shape there. And I think he's fine. Well,
I really do think. But if this upset happens, this one against
that f and team, dude, Jerry is not gonna be okay with that.
Well, it's just like anything else, Kevin. If you if they
make it to the super Bowl, all of the mistakes that he made in
the regular season are forgotten. If you lose in the first round, you
go back and look at all those things, they're a lot more illuminated.
And then you look at the loss in the playoffs as the straw that broke
the camel's back. I'm just say, Jerry's not gonna take his anger out
on bones. You know, if they lose this game, Jerry will in
his right hand have the rocks glass with Johnny Walker blue. His hand will
start to shake and he will crush the glass and maybe a trickle of blood
and Johnny Walker on his hand, and he will be irate. I will
give you that. And if he does, remember how he felt the same
exact way when we got Cowboys got annihilated by the forty nine ers, and
that next day I was like, he will not forget this. There is
a chance. But they got to lose pretty ugly, I think. And
to answer the ultimate question, I think, no, Mike McCarthy is not
getting fired next week, and no he shouldn't and no they're not going to
lose. How about that. That was your super Wildcard Pump session for today.
We'll be back tomorrow with another super Wildcard pump secon the pump right now
at Safferding Goose Morning News. Comedian Joe Key hosted the Golden Globes. He
has spoken about his largely shaky performance and I will tell you next what he
how he felt about pissing off Taylor Swift.