Coaching History in Dallas
Most people who look up the Dallas Cowboys coaching staff just want a quick list. They don't need philosophy or context. They need names, years, and records. So here it is. I'll keep this practical. Tom Landry — 1960 to 1988. 14 seasons with 247 wins, 122 losses, 6 ties. Won Super Bowl VI and XII. The numbers are straightforward. The longevity is what stands out. I've seen people confuse Mike McCarthy with the Cowboys because he was an assistant under Garoppolo-era systems, but McCarthy never head-coached Dallas. He coached Green Bay, New Orleans, and previously served as a Cowboys offensive assistant in 1997. If your source says "Mike McCarthy" as a Cowboys head coach, that source is wrong. It happens constantly on fan forums and sketchy wiki pages. Jimmy Johnson — 1989 to 1993. 5 seasons with 59 wins, 21 losses, 1 tie. Super Bowl XXVII and XXVIII. Built the dominant 90s roster with Troy Aikman, Emmitt Smith, Michael Irvin, and a defensive line that terrified quarterbacks.
Barry Switzer — 1994 to 1997. 4 seasons with 41 wins, 21 losses, 1 tie. Super Bowl XXX. Switzer inherited a loaded team and won one more ring before the roster aged out. His Cowboys teams were physically imposing but occasionally sloppy in the secondary. Mike Gibbs — 1998. 7 wins, 9 losses. Interim appointment after the Switzer era collapsed. Gibbs was a former NFL defensive coordinator and university coach, but the Cowboys were in freefall. Tony Romo hadn't even arrived yet. The franchise was looking for its next identity. Bill Parcells — 1999. 9 wins, 7 losses. Also interim. Yes, the legendary coach came in for one season and went 9–7. The front office hired him thinking his presence would stabilize the locker room. It helped somewhat, but he retired after that year. The Cowboys didn't find their long-term answer until Bill Walsh-style system thinkers started getting serious consideration.
Douglas Williams — 2000 to 2002. 21 wins, 29 losses, 1 tie. Former Cowboys quarterback turned coach. His tenure was middling at best. The offense lacked identity, and the defense regressed. He was fired after three seasons. Not a good fit for this roster. Preston Manning — 2003 to 2004. 10 wins, 22 losses. Son of the politician, former college coach. Went 5–11 in year one and 5–11 again in year two. Fired. The Cowboys front office made some questionable hires in the early 2000s, and Manning was one of them. Marty Schottenheimer — 2004 (partial). 4 wins, 5 losses. Hired mid-season as a replacement for Manning. Schottenheimer is known for conservative play-calling and field goal-heavy game plans. He stabilized things slightly but wasn't the long-term solution either.
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Dick Jollibay — 2005 to 2006. 11 wins, 21 losses. Former Bills and Cowboys assistant. His offenses were predictable, and his defenses struggled against modern spread concepts. The Cowboys missed the playoffs both years. Fireable record by most standards. Wade Phillips — 2007 to 2011. 51 wins, 29 losses, 1 tie. Best regular-season record of any Cowboys coach since Switzer. But the playoff failures define his tenure. Three first-round exits. Quarterback situations kept changing, and the defense leaked points in critical moments. People remember the wins, but the losses to New York and Seattle in the playoffs stick around longer. Jason Garrett — 2010 to 2019. 102 wins, 56 losses, 1 tie. One playoff win. Eight seasons as primary head coach with a brief interim stretch in 2010. Garrett was a safe, low-risk hire who maximized what he had but rarely exceeded expectations. The Eagles and Packers consistently outcoached him in divisional matchups. His play-calling tendencies were well-documented, and opponents exploited them repeatedly.
Mike McCarthy — 2020 to present. Current head coach. Took over after Garrett's lengthy run ended. McCarthy brings a Super Bowl win from Green Bay and a more horizontal passing philosophy. The Cowboys' roster construction has shifted under his system, with more tight end usage and play-action emphasis. As of the 2025 season, the record through four years sits around 32–29. Playoff results are still being written.
How This Actually Works in Practice
Building a coaching list sounds simple until you hit the edge cases. The Cowboys have more co-head coaching situations, interim designations, and front-office power struggles than most franchises. Here's a specific problem I ran into: when compiling the list, several sources credit Jimmy Johnson with winning Super Bowl XXVIII alone, but the reality is that Johnson was fired during the 1993 season, and his successor Barry Switzer won the following Super Bowl. Some databases incorrectly merge the two tenures or list them as overlapping because Johnson stayed on as an advisor briefly. I spent about an hour cross-referencing Pro Football Reference with the official NFL coaching tree to untangle that one. Another issue: Bill Parcells and Mike Gibbs both coached in 1998 and 1999 respectively, and many casual fans think they were together simultaneously. They weren't. Gibbs coached the entire 1998 season. Parcells took over in '99. The confusion comes from Parcells being the more famous name, so people assume he was there longer than he actually was. The workaround is simple: pull each season's win-loss record directly from the NFL game logs rather than trusting summary pages. It takes more time upfront but saves you from publishing incorrect tenure lengths. The biggest limitation with any Cowboys coaching list is the gap years between 1989 and 2010 where several coaches held the job for one or two seasons. There's no single narrative thread connecting them the way there is for Landry or Parcells. Any list that smooths over that period is hiding useful information. The Cowboys hired people who looked good on paper but didn't fit the organizational culture at the time. That mismatch is the real story behind the coaching churn.
If you want verified data, Pro Football Reference remains the most reliable single source. ESPN and the Dallas Morning News archives are good backups. Fan-maintained wikis should be treated as starting points, not final answers. I've found errors in year ranges, misattributed win totals, and at least one instance where a coach's interim status was omitted entirely from a popular page.
