The Dallas Cowboys will be bringing a bit of Green Bay Packers mojo to prominence this season– and they hope it won’t blow up in their face.
Former Packers quarterback Scott Tolzien, who was named quarterback coach for the Cowboys this offseason, is set to take the reins as the closest voice to veteran quarterback Dak Prescott’s ear.
Tolzien, who’s been working as an assistant under Cowboy’s head coach McCarthy since 2020, played for McCarthy in Green Bay from 2013-2015. The Rolling Meadows, IL native and Wisconsin Badgers alumn played for the Indianapolis Colts in a short NFL career that saw him play in just 10 games and start only four. He also served as a scouting analyst for the Badgers in 2019.
Now, the 35-year-old ex-QB will find himself with a major stake in an offense that ranks among the best in the league, helping guide a quarterback who also rates among the elite in the sport. And he’ll be doing this underneath new Cowboys offensive coordinator, the veteran Brian Schottenheimer.
But McCarthy is supremely confident in Tolzien, learning of his football IQ and work ethic from back in his Green Bay days.
“Scott’s mental preparation from day one, he stood alone,” McCarthy told reporters during a press conference last Thursday. “Instead of playbooks, we went from a paper playbook to the iPads. So you know, there’s something that you watch for, you’ve got corrections and testing and things like that. Scott was always at the top of the list of how much time he spent on his iPad, compared to his teammates. It wasn’t even close.”
“I don’t know if he ever went home,” McCarthy added. “He was always at the facility…He couldn’t get enough of it. You could tell right away, just his mental preparation was top-notch of all the guys I’ve worked with.”
McCarthy has already told his starting QB Prescott that he plans on fine tuning the Cowboy’s offense, changing things up about “20-30%.” The hope is that the tweaks and modifications will be enough to turbo charge an already effective offense, especially in key situations and in the postseason.
“Right now, Mike [McCarthy] told me [about] 20-30% change,” Prescott told media. “I think if anything, it’s things that need to be changed. Sometimes change is good. I’m a big believer in change.”
The thinking is that a new voice in Prescott’s ear will solidify and stabilize the star quarterback’s game and allow for even further growth.
Time will tell if McCarthy’s confidence in Tolzien is warranted. This is definitely the kind of move that either screams “stroke of genius” or “what a screw up.”
