What went wrong: How the Dallas Cowboys sank despite Super Bowl aspirations

DALLAS — The disastrous 2024 season for the Dallas Cowboys was easy to see coming. After a tumultuous offseason that saw the team sleepwalk through free agency, and take months to agree to new deals with their priority franchise players, the Cowboys followed up their lackadaisical roster building with a disappointing 7-10 season.

Not much went right for the Cowboys during the 2024 campaign, and as such, they were rewarded by missing the playoffs for the first time since 2020. Head coach Mike McCarthy had led the Cowboys to three consecutive 12-win seasons, a streak which ended and relegated the franchise to the 12th pick in the 2025 draft.

Here’s what went wrong for the Cowboys in 2024:

The offseason should be a time where the team uses free agency, trades and the draft to improve. While free agency is one of the top avenues to get better for 31 other organizations, the Cowboys have decided to forgo the option in recent years, instead choosing to use salary cap constraints that all teams face as an excuse to not sign quality players. 

Normally the Cowboys don’t use free agency until the second and third waves to patch up their obvious holes, but last offseason they basically sat out the entire free agency period. Not only did they not sign many outside players, but Dallas also lost much of their depth while standing idly by as other teams got better.

Meanwhile, by waiting on signing quarterback Dak Prescott and wide receiver CeeDee Lamb to extensions close to the start of the season, Jerry and Stephen Jones used a built-in excuse that they couldn’t afford anyone else but the two high-priced players. The delay in signing both cost the team valuable cap space, which they could’ve used on outside free agents. Instead, they allowed the days to turn into months, and the Cowboys made very few signings to improve.

The draft brought help, but most of the players selected were inexperienced at their positions and needed time to develop. The Cowboys decided to provide that luxury, but it hurt the 2024 team. First-round selection Tyler Guyton had a bumpy road at left tackle, his rough season included penalty woes and being benched. The only real immediate help from the draft came from third-round pick Cooper Beebe, who started 16 games at center and acquitted himself well.

It was a catastrophic offseason that led to a horrific regular season, and it could’ve been avoided.

There was a prevailing thought that it would take some time for the Dallas defense to adjust to Mike Zimmer’s scheme after he was brought in as the defensive coordinator to replace Dan Quinn. That adjustment took longer than expected, however, and Dallas felt the sting over the first 10 games of the season that sunk their campaign.

Things got much better from mid-November on for the defense, but they couldn’t recover from allowing five of their first nine opponents to rush for over 175 yards against them, including two teams going for over 200 yards on the ground. The Cowboys finished the year 29th against the run, giving up over 137 rushing yards per game, and a league-worst 25 rushing touchdowns.

Zimmer’s defense had trouble stopping the run, just as his predecessor did, but the veteran coaches’ defense also allowed more than 40 points three times on the year, matching the total of the previous regime’s three seasons combined.

Injuries hurt, including defensive end DeMarcus Lawrence missing 13 games and All-Pro cornerbacks DaRon Bland and Trevon Diggs only played one game together as each missed significant time. But even with the injuries, it wasn’t a good year for a defense that had gotten used to dominating under Quinn. They turned it around late in the year, but the damage had already been done.

Despite wasting another 12-win season in 2023, the decision makers for the Cowboys opted to bring Mike McCarthy back for the year, but not to extend his contract, making him a lame duck coach. It was unfair to McCarthy, but the veteran coach did little to convince anyone – outside of the Joneses – that he should be retained long term. 

The season was littered with curious decisions from McCarthy and his offense took a major step back from where it was in 2023. Last season, the offense put up almost 30 points per game with McCarthy and Prescott leading the way for the Texas Coast offense, which was tops in the league. In 2024, the Cowboys scored a measly 20.6 ppg, good for just 21st in the NFL.

Part of the falloff was because Prescott missed half the year, but it was also because McCarthy didn’t recognize that Rico Dowdle was his best running back on the roster until late November. When Dowdle was finally used, the offense played much better and the veteran RB wound up rushing for more than 1,000 yards with a string of 100+ yard games during Dallas’ best stretch of the season.

The indecision and inability for McCarthy to get the most from his offense, or to evolve into a modern version of an offense, was a big part of the season’s failure.

If there is a god of injuries, the Cowboys didn’t pay enough tribute to stay healthy. From the start of training camp, the injuries crippled the team, and because they decided to forgo free agency, there wasn’t enough depth to make up for their health issues.

Breakout candidate Sam Williams got the ball rolling when he was hurt in late July and missed the entire season with a torn ACL. Bland capped the end of camp with a foot injury that would cost him 10 games.

When the regular season arrived, it was no kinder for the Cowboys, who lost their starting QB for the season in Week 9 and Lawrence in Week 4. Among others who missed significant time included pass rusher Micah Parsons, who was out four weeks, fellow DE Mashawn Kneeland missed six, CB Diggs missed six, right tackle Zack Martin was out for seven, and their All-Pro WR Lamb missed the last two games with a nagging shoulder injury. 

There were a host of other regular contributors who missed a few games as well, but that’s a long list of the Cowboys’ best players who were out for a significant amount of time. Dallas caught the injury bug pretty good in 2024, and it was a factor in their subpar season.

The Cowboys didn’t put together a great showing with their physical play, but the mental mistakes and penalties cost them all season long. McCarthy’s team was fourth in the league in penalties this year, committing 128 infractions, their worst output in 25 seasons.

Many of those penalties were also pre-snap mistakes, where the Cowboys were tied for the league lead in false starts with 29. That’s an unacceptable number of infractions for a team that needed to play clean football to survive with the rest of the calamities befalling them. This is an issue that has plagued McCarthy during his tenure and it only got worse in 2024.

The entire team looked bad this season, but it wasn’t helped by the play of its most important player when he was still competing. Prescott struggled in the eight games that he played and was headed for one of his worst seasons. 

After a season where he played arguably his best football, finishing second in MVP voting, Prescott’s play regressed. The league looked like it had caught up with McCarthy’s offense and Prescott didn’t look prepared, or like he had the answers, throwing eight interceptions in eight games after throwing nine during the entire 2023 campaign.

It’s difficult to pinpoint why Prescott struggled, but he didn’t look anything like the QB who has been playing at a high level during Dallas’ string of 12-win seasons. If Prescott isn’t playing like a top QB, the Cowboys have virtually no chance, and that played out during the season.

One of the surprising issues of the season was the Cowboys becoming one of the worst home teams in the league, winning just two games at AT&T Stadium. The team had won the prior 16 regular season home games, but they were embarrassed almost weekly in front of their own fans in 2024. 

Jones’ team allowed two 40-point efforts against them at home and lost four games by more than 20 points in the place dubbed Jerry World. In all, the Cowboys went 2-7 at home this year. Losing at home is never good, and especially so when it had appeared that the team had built quite a home field advantage. Whatever advantage they had has been erased to add another item on the list of woes for Dallas in 2024.

What do you think was the biggest issue for the Cowboys in 2024? Share your thoughts with Ben on X (formerly Twitter) @BenGrimaldi.