Mike McCarthy may be coming around on tight ends, and that could very well influence the decision the Cowboys make in the first round of the draft this Thursday night.
Speaking at the team’s annual pre-draft press conference on Monday, the head coach talked about the growing importance of the position in today’s NFL. His answers- along with how Dallas used its platoon of tight ends last season- strongly suggest that he’ll be looking to take a tight end at some point this weekend.
And the coach has a good idea of what he’s searching for.
“Well, there’s really three primary positions that they play in,” he told reporters at The Star. “[Number One], Some call it the traditional Y position, where they’re playing next to the tackle on the line of scrimmage. [Number Two], Their ability to be a movement player whether it’s moving in the backfield or moving along the line of scrimmage, doing some heavy lifting. And then [Number Three, being] able to play in the third component of being displaced as a receiver.”
The Cowboys, like all the other offenses in the league, ask their tight ends to be multi-skill players: block effectively when needed, serve as a safety-blanket outlet in the passing game, go in motion to cause hesitation for a defense who can’t be sure which job he’s about to do on any given play.
And he has to do all of them at an exceedingly high level for it to work.
“It’s about matchups. You’re always trying to create favorable matchups for your players.”
For tight end prospects to really register in McCarthy’s radar, though, it starts with genetics.
“It’s our responsibility as coaches to make sure our boundaries have the ability to take advantage of any quality player that fits a physical profile of how we want to look as a football team. So that’s no different at any position. So the tight end position, obviously, versatility. As many 6-4, 250 pound men that can play on four downs. I don’t think you can have enough of that body type on your team. Because of the way it gives you the ability to play offensively,” the coach offered. “There’s more versatility there.”
McCarthy’s physical preferences become obvious by lining up his current tight end group.
Jake Ferguson, Peyton Hendershot, Sean McKeon, and Seth Green are all listed as either 6-foot-4 or 6-foot-5. All weigh between 238 and 254 pounds. Dalton Schultz was 6-foot-5, 244 pounds.
Yeah, McCarthy has a type.
Even in Green Bay, the tight ends he drafted (and who stuck) fit the mold. Jermichael Finley: 6-foot-5, 247. Andrew Quarless: 6-foot-4, 252. Richard Rodgers: 6-foot-4, 257.
While most collegiate tight ends entering the league are also roughly that same height and weight, McCarthy’s history and his stated ideal (“6-4, 250 pound men”) would seem to make Notre Dame’s Michael Mayer (6-foot-4, 249 pounds) the prototype and give him the slightest of edges over Utah’s Dalton Kincaid 6-foot-3, 246). Georgia’s Darnell Washington is actually quite a bit bigger at 6-foot-6 and 264. Even Oregon State’s Luke Musgrave is suddenly in the conversation at 6-foot-5 and 253.
Those four just happen to represent the top quartet of tight ends in Dane Brugler’s The Beast draft guide, and all may be in play for Dallas with the 26th overall pick.
But as McCarthy said Monday, “You’ve got to trust your board.”
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While it’s not known where any of those tight ends rank on the Cowboys’ master list relative to other positions, the coach did admit that tight end has been bumped up- at least for him- into the same level of importance as the traditional “Money Five” positions: quarterback, wide receiver, cornerback, left tackle, and edge rusher.
“I understand that most people feel there are primary positions when you’re assessing value,” he explained, “but I think in today’s game, the safety position and the tight end position can start to challenge to being a primary position, in my view of how I look at positions in football.”
McCarthy has something of a reputation for largely ignoring the tight end position while he was with the Packers, but last year’s numbers in Dallas point to an ongoing change in philosophy.
As Cowboys Wire pointed out earlier this offseason, the Cowboys used 12 personnel (one wide receiver, two tight ends) on 31% of their first-down snaps in 2022. That ranked 6th-most often across the league. In McCarthy’s final year in Green Bay, his 12 personnel usage ranked 29th.
Then again, he never had the kind of tight end depth in Green Bay that the Cowboys have given him over the past three seasons
“It was not a philosophy [in Green Bay] that we don’t take a tight end in the first round. That wasn’t the case. I think it really comes down to the board.”
All indications are this year’s board will yield yet another big-bodied weapon for McCarthy to deploy at tight end in Dallas.
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