Out of all of the new staff hires for the Dallas Cowboys in the Brian Schottenheimer era, there is one that should inspire confidence the most when it comes to trusting what the first-time head coach is looking for. Serving as a non-play-calling offensive coordinator for two seasons before being promoted to head coach, Schottenheimer had this very same role to fill (since he will call plays himself) on his inaugural staff. The Cowboys new offensive coordinator is former Arizona Cardinals offensive line coach Klayton Adams.
The Cowboys have also kept continuity at tight end with coach Lunda Wells, something of a fan-favorite to at least be considered for the OC role himself if that promotion could guarantee he remained in Dallas. Instead, it will now be up to Schottenheimer, Adams, and Wells to all do their part in improving this team’s play in the trenches. Regardless of what the Cowboys want their new offense to look like, improved offensive line play must come with it for this team to have any chance at returning to contender status, and they believe they’ve found their man in Adams. Also bringing past experience as a tight ends coach, the cohesion between Adams and Wells should be strong to make sure the Cowboys are fundamentally sound up front.
Between Petzing and Adams, the Cardinals have built an offense that, in many ways, mirrors the offense that Stefanski runs in Cleveland. There are strong influences of the Shanahan type offense that Stefanski majored in with the Vikings, but with a more varied blocking scheme in the run game.
For example, the Cardinals have been one of the top gap-blocking teams in the league these past two years, using at least one pulling offensive lineman on just under two thirds of their run plays this past year. In 2024, they found great success running counter, finishing second in the NFL in counter run plays but showing a wide variation of formations they ran it from.
The Cardinals didn’t just have a strong running game, though. They excelled in pass protection too: their 28.0% pressure rate was the sixth-best in the league, ranking one spot ahead of the Cowboys, despite losing both starting tackles to injured reserve and playing with a quarterback in Kyler Murray whose frequent scrambling ability often makes it harder on the offensive line to hold up.
Part of this was accomplished through an insanely high play-action rate, something Schottenheimer has already mentioned as a priority for his offense. Only three other quarterbacks had a higher play-action rate than Murray this year, and only four quarterbacks threw for more yards off play-action.
One other point to consider with Adams’ hiring: the tight end position. Outside of the offensive line, Adams has spent the most time in his career working with the tight end position, and Trey McBride became a focal point for the Cardinals this year.
Don’t look now, but the Cowboys may actually be backing up their talk with real actions. This team has been yelling from the mountaintop towards anyone and everyone that would listen about how much they want to run the ball better. Their former head coach Mike McCarthy did the same thing, despite going into his final season with Rico Dowdle and Ezekiel Elliott supposedly ready to carry the full load. This turned into just Dowdle being the best lead back option Dallas had after Elliott was released toward the end of the season.
All outside opinions on the Schottenheimer hire aside for a moment, the Cowboys are not actively looking to set up their latest head coach for failure. This is a hire that puts the front office in a spotlight so much brighter than expected, coming out of nowhere after a short interview process with other candidates and fanfare about Deion Sanders or Jason Witten that never amounted to anything. They will have to own the successes and failures of Schottenheimer, which starts with owning the failures from the 2024 team, of which the running game was one of the biggest.
Is Schottenheimer here to lead this team through something of a rebuild? Possibly yes. Can this rebuild be accelerated if the Cowboys coaching commitment to the run game so far is met with personnel moves that balance the offense more? Also yes.
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Schottenheimer has talked about a strong commitment to “marrying” the Cowboys run and pass game concepts in an effort to be a strong play-action team. Hiring Adams to work on how the offensive line can get off the ball the same way on both runs and passes is a huge step here. This was a strength of the Cardinals offense with the incredibly mobile Kyler Murray at quarterback. The Cowboys and Schottenheimer also seem committed to turning back the clock for Dak Prescott, using his mobility, offensive tempo, and short to intermediate accuracy to advance the offense. So far, this has been met with healthy skepticism as Prescott is coming off another season-ending injury. He is certainly not, and never has been, Kyler Murray when it comes to tucking the ball and running. He is also very unlikely to have some of the same deeply talented receiving corps the Cowboys have fielded around Prescott in the past, although adding a more legitimate option outside of CeeDee Lamb is reportedly a priority.
This leaves just the running game and protection up front as areas the Cowboys were dominant in at the start of Prescott’s career, and can look to return to in helping the highest-paid QB in the league for 2025 and beyond. Hiring a former tight end and offensive line coach as offensive coordinator is a huge signal the Cowboys are actually serious about this. The connection that was made instantly after the Cowboys announced the hiring of Adams.
The Cardinals offensive line was led in snaps by center Hjalte Froholdt, Isaiah Adams at right guard, Paris Johnson Jr. at left tackle, Jonah Williams at right tackle, and Evan Brown at left guard last season. Froholdt and Paris Jr. had just one season of starting experience prior to 2024, and Adams was a third-round rookie. The Cowboys have the right man in charge to see them through retooling an offensive line in need of a lot of work.
Rookies Tyler Guyton and Cooper Beebe took their lumps as first-year, week-one starters and will be eager to jump into a new scheme that should allow them to play out in space more under Schottenheimer and Adams. Left guard Tyler Smith can become the face of this position group, already dominant as a run blocker in this role while more than solid in pass protection. The right side is where Dallas has the most questions right now, depending on if veteran Zack Martin wants to return after missing seven games in his 11th season. The future Hall of Fame lineman will need a new contract to do so, as he’s set to hit free agency along with Chuma Edoga and Brock Hoffman (restricted free agency).
Both Edoga and Hoffman played valuable roles as backups in ‘24, with Edoga spelling Guyton at left tackle and Hoffman filling in at both guard and center. The Cowboys should also be pointing Adams in the direction of Terence Steele as soon as physically possible, as they’ve always favored the right tackle’s ability to get out and set the edge in the run game. Dallas has lived with issues in pass protection from Steele because of this, but having Adams round out his game could work wonders in keeping Prescott upright moving forward.
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Of course, there is also the issue of who will be taking handoffs for the Cowboys looking to get the most out of whatever improved line play they do find. The Ashton Jeanty talk may truly just be getting started with plenty of the fire where the smoke of the Cowboys being serious about being a physical run team again is. However, in Adams’ first two seasons working under Kliff Kingsbury in Arizona (a coach rumored at one point to be a candidate himself for the Cowboys HC opening after his work with Jayden Daniels and the Commanders in the division), the Cardinals were led in rushing by James Conner. The 2017 third-round pick had a career high 15 touchdowns in his fifth season in 2021, and followed it up with seven more and a ten yard increase in yards per game in 2022. When the Cardinals brought in the defensive-minded head coach Jonathan Gannon, the downhill run game saw an even bigger jump with Conner. His first two thousand-yard seasons of his career came in 2023 and 2024, with a career high five yards per carry in ‘23.
The Cowboys, of course, stopped fully short of hiring a defensive head coach themselves, but Schottenheimer was a part of three of McCarthy’s staffs which insisted on playing complementary football in all three phases. It was insanely difficult for the Cowboys to do this when constantly passing the ball while trailing on the scoreboard a year ago, and by the looks of it Schottenheimer has much more coherent plans to keep Dallas within their game scripts on Sundays. Similarly to how the offensive staff hires so far point to exactly what the Cowboys want to do well on this side of the ball, the defense has made a shift to embracing their front seven more, another strong complementary option for a team with a dominant ground game.
The Cowboys have also retained the services of Will McClay as a talent evaluator for this offseason and moving forward. His track record of finding offensive linemen is very strong. Being at the college All Star games this past week with a vision already in place for what Schottenheimer and Adams are looking for is a huge advantage. The missing piece remains who will be in the backfield. Dallas can look to both Super Bowl participants as examples of the different ways to build a backfield in today’s NFL. The Eagles made perhaps the greatest free agent signing of all time by bringing in Saquon Barkley and immediately returning to the Super Bowl on the legs of his 2,005 yard season. The Chiefs have taken a different approach, leaning on veteran Kareem Hunt, a previous third-round pick of theirs. The Cowboys need to be open to all options when it comes to driving home the message of this offseason so far, which is running the football well again.
Prior to the Adams hiring, it was easy to look at the makeup of the Cowboys roster and call the front office even more directionless for thinking they could make this a running team again. There’s no denying the results have been there for the Cowboys in recent history when they are dominant on the ground though, and if this is the only way they know how to win, the support staff is in place to help do so. Like we said, don’t look now, but through the circus-like nature of it all, the Cowboys may actually be addressing the football side of their operation head on and taking an element of the game that was doomed to fail from last year into a strength. The offensive coaching staff under Schottenheimer is certainly sending a clear message.
