But Randy, when you look at what's happened so far this year, do you think it's more on the players or on the coaches?

Were you looking every week?

We sit here and talk about not week.

Let's talk about year.

Every year we sit here and talk about the Dallas Cowboys.

There's one thing that's obvious.

We talk about their talent.

Yep, you know.

And over the years, Hey, it's a daggone.

Shame that there was a waste of talent on the Dallas Cowboys.

So we just got through talking about the New York Giants and and how they climb back in the NFC East.

Uh, lead.

We're talk about coaching on, and I think when you talk about the Dallas Cowboys, you get a new head coach has had some time off there.

You're coming back to a game that has changed since you left.

And I remember early October taking up for Xavier Woods, the guy in the secondary talking about, uh, we don't play every snap hard or something, like I had to come to his defense because of I knew what type of shots was being fired in Dallas and coming out of Dallas.

So, Sam, to answer your question, it has to be the coaching because you heard players coming out in the month of September.

They what, Naming names.

They were just talking about just trying to fill this new head coach and his coaching staff out.

And I think for for most of the season, the finger pointing has been at the coaching and not the players, and it starts sometimes with McCarthy, you got to do the right things in terms of If you gotta call somebody out, you call them out, whether it's in the media, whether it's in the team meetings or something, because the best coaches don't wanna be your friends, they just wanna be your coach and get your playing better.

So I think based on who McCarthy is, he's got to do everything he can to figure out if he's got a bunch of front running players there in that locker room or he's got or does he have players that the game means something to him?

And even though you may not have a chance, you still go out there and play hard and find a way to win.

Watch your players closely and how they respond, how you determine how you measure, how much someone cares by the effort they give defensively.

I don't care.

They have talent, Randy.

You're right.

But you don't need talent to show effort.

The effort there for me has not been at the standard that that it should be.

See, I I think it's everybody's gotta take blame, but it starts with the mirror.

You gotta look yourself in the mirror and say, What can I do to get this this thing better?

And to Randy?

Because you did.

You did defend that guy when I was like Randy, there's no excuse for that.

Remember, It's like effort.

You gotta You gotta put it out there every single play, but the great ones, man.

I mean, if we policed each other, whether it's coach to player, player to player, coach to coach, whatever, man, I mean, you want to show off at least as a za coach.

I couldn't wait for my team to get on the field because I knew we were gonna play our tails off this thing right here.

It's like, how could you be dead last in the league and run defense and scoring or whatever and then you're dead.

Last in scoring offense, in fact, went down with this kind of collection of talent.

You better take it personally.

If you're a football coach, you have thio, but those players they're accountable to.

But apparently you're not keeping them as accountable is they should be the bruise point.

So, man, there's a lot of problems going on.

They need to hire some difference makers, Uh, in that coaching staff that that actually had that kind of passion.

I don't sense that with this group of the best teams, the best teams, I believe, are the teams when the Players care mawr than the coaches and like, that's a special thing that you confined sometimes on the great teams where players you don't even need the coaches that okay, like this is our team.

We're gonna we're gonna take care of this and they clearly don't have that right now.

And there's a lot of teams that don't have that, but the great teams do have that.

We just got through talking about the NFC East leading New York Giants and they just talked about.

How did they get better?

They talked about coaching.

Just a year ago.

The Giants wasn't even in the discussion to even compete in the NFC.

So you sit up here talking about what a year makes.

The New York Giants got a new head coach and Joe Judge.

So did the Dallas Cowboys.

What's the difference?

Players or coaching?

I say it's coaching.

Coming from Dallas?

Yeah, not just a year ago.

I mean, they weren't in the discussion four weeks ago.

Things have changed very quickly for New York.

If things seem especially bad in Dallas right now, that's because there are.

It's their worst record through 12 since 1989.

It's been a while since they've been this bad.

But on a positive note, they're not eliminated yet.

If the Giants and Washington lose today, there just one game out of that top spot in the NFC East.

Lucky them that this is the year E thanks for watching ESPN on YouTube for live streaming sports and premium content.