Former Dallas Cowboys Pro Bowl tight end Jason Witten is reportedly emerging as a front-runner to fill the head coaching vacancy of his old team.
On Monday, news broke that the Cowboys parted ways with head coach Mike McCarthy after failing to agree on a new deal. McCarthy’s five-year deal was up, and it took owner Jerry Jones eight days to finally settle on a coaching change following the team’s Week 18 regular-season finale.
Plenty of big names have been thrown around as potential successors to McCarthy, including Jon Gruden, Doug Pederson, Deion Sanders (Prime Time confirmed having conversations with Jones) and Kellen More.
According to Pro Football Talk’s Mike Florio, Jason Witten himself is also a prominent name to follow in the Cowboys’ head coaching search:
“There’s another name to keep an eye on. Former Cowboys tight end Jason Witten. Some with knowledge of the dynamics of the organization believe he will at some point (not necessarily now) be the Cowboys’ head coach. And if McCarthy had agreed to proceed with a short-term contract, Witten might have joined the staff for some NFL coaching experience before ascending to the top job.
With McCarthy gone, maybe Jerry Jones takes a page out of the Jim Irsay playbook. After foolishly firing Frank Reich early in the 2022 season, Irsay even more foolishly hired former Colts center Jeff Saturday, who had limited coaching experience exclusively at the high-school level.”
