The Dallas Cowboys are expected to interview Robert Saleh for their head coaching vacancy.
On Wednesday it was reported that the Dallas Cowboys are expected to interview former New York Jets head coach Robert Saleh for their own head coach vacancy. This is a significant development as it is the first reference to an interview expected to happen, and not just a rumor like Deion Sanders, Kellen Moore or Jason Witten.
Saleh was the first head coach fired this past season as the Jets moved on from him after their Week 5 loss against the Minnesota Vikings in London. Anyone paying attention to the NFL for the last couple of years has known the “situation” (to be kind) that Saleh has been in relative to coaching the Jets with Aaron Rodgers and all of his antics, and it all reached a boiling point where the team felt it necessary to move on from him before mid-October.
Needless to say Saleh was hardly given a fair deal with the Jets, although his 20-36 record as their head coach is hardly one that suggests he was doing a great job.
Saleh is a former disciple of Kyle Shanahan’s, although a defensive-minded one. He was already coaching the Jets when Dallas first met Shanahan’s San Francisco 49ers in the playoffs in 2021 (obviously later again the next year), but he flourished under Shanahan and helped pave the way for everyone on San Francisco’s defense (including the staffers) to help have success.
That Saleh is a defensive-minded coach is a significant thing relative to the Cowboys. It has been a very long time since Dallas had a head coach who specialized on that side of the ball. Consider that Mike McCarthy and Jason Garrett were both offensive-minded coaches and that the latter took over fully in 2011.
This means that the last time Dallas was run by a defensive-minded head coach was Wade Phillips in 2010, but the last time Dallas hired a defensive-minded head coach was Phillips three years earlier in 2007.
There are arguments to be made against hiring defensive coaches as the NFL is such an offensive-driven league. Taking a look at the eight teams left standing in the Divisional Round as just an example, the most notable names are offensive in Andy Reid and Sean McVay. I suppose you could throw Nick Sirianni in there as well.
Sean McDermott and Demeco Ryans (a former 49ers defensive coordinator himself) are also defensive coaches so there is room for everything in this discussion. Consider that Baltimore Ravens head coach John Harbaugh hails from special teams to prove that point even further.
But that has been a direction the Cowboys have avoided going in for a very long time now. With Micah Parsons in tow though for the future (we expect) it stands to reason that Dallas could be wise to build around him in an overall sense.
Whatever the case, Robert Saleh is the first name to pop up with an interview expected to happen.
