FRISCO, Texas -- When the Dallas Cowboys open the 2019 NFL season Sunday against the New York Giants, there will be few -- if any -- coaches in the league under more pressure than Jason Garrett.
This is Garrett's 28th season in professional football as a player or coach, including 21 with the Cowboys. By Dec. 29, it could be over if Garrett does not just win but win big.
There is no other way to say it: He is coaching for his job.
Cowboys owner and general manager Jerry Jones has done little to defuse the hot-seat talk. Jones has opted to let Garrett coach the final year of his contract without an extension, despite the fact that in 2018 the Cowboys made the playoffs -- the first time they'd ever done so after a 3-5 start -- won a postseason game.
At the opening news conference of training camp, Jones playfully deflected a question about what Garrett has to do to be the Cowboys' coach in 2020.
"What did you say?" Jones feigned. "I really didn't hear you."
There was non-stop noise coming from a construction site not far from where Jones was talking.
"I really didn't hear you," said Jones, bringing his hand to his ear. "Got a damn drill back over there."
Jones laughed. The media laughed. Garrett, sitting immediately to his right, did not change expression.
"Next question," Jones said.
Seizing each day
After eight seasons as coach of the Cowboys and eight games as the interim coach in 2010 and two playoff wins, some have made their minds up about Garrett.
His critics believe Garrett is perennially an 8-8 coach. The reality: The Cowboys have not been .500 since 2013.
His critics believe all he does on game day is clap. The reality: The Cowboys have won more games since the beginning of the 2016 season (32) than any team in the NFC.
His critics believe he can't manage late-game situations. The reality: In 2018, the Cowboys won nine of 13 games that were within one score in the fourth quarter.
The only thing Garrett can do to change minds is something the organization has not done since the 1995 season: win a Super Bowl.
He will not do it by changing what got him here in the first place.
When Garrett took over as head coach for Wade Phillips in 2010, he told a story about a monk friend. It's a story he has shared as a player when things were going poorly, and it's a story he told last week at the Cowboys' kickoff luncheon at AT&T Stadium.
Here’s how it goes: Lions and tigers are chasing a Buddhist monk. When the monk reaches a cliff, he looks back to see the lions and tigers chasing him. As he looks down, he sees hundreds of snakes. He jumps and grabs a branch.
As he looks up, he sees the lions and tigers. As he looks down, he sees the snakes. The branch starts to wobble because three rats are chewing its base.
He looks to the other side and sees the most beautiful bushel of strawberries he has ever seen. He can't climb up because of the lions and tigers. He can't climb down because of the snakes. And the rats are chewing the only lifeline he has.
So what does the monk do?
He devours the strawberries.
Translation: Garrett is not worrying about a contract extension. He is devouring each day.
"A lot of people talk about eliminating distractions and outside noise," tight end Jason Witten said. "I've been around [Garrett] for 12 years, I don't know anybody in my life that does that better than him. That’s hard to do but I think that he does. Look at the team last year, 3-5 and they didn't blink. Come back and win the division. That's the sign of a good coach -- when players play hard for him regardless of those moments."
Garrett has been around professional football for most of his life; his father, Jim, was a coach and scout for nearly 40 years. He understands everything is temporary, even as the longest-serving head coach Jones has employed in Dallas. As a player, he saw teammates come and go. As a head coach, he has made changes to his staff.
But for those expecting him to change who he is with his future on the line, don’t bet on it. Garrett believes his convictions will ultimately win the day.
"He comes in and just coaches with an incredible amount of intensity no matter what the situation is," said linebacker Sean Lee, one of three players on the roster whom Garrett inherited from Phillips. "You know that you're going to get an incredibly infectious, positive coach, who's going to give us whatever we need from a motivation standpoint, an X's and O's standpoint. He's a guy that inspires us daily in meetings. He always has something for us. He's always the same guy."
Garrett doesn't vary. It could before the sixth organized team activity of the offseason program or a midsummer training camp practice in Oxnard, California. The Cowboys could win by 20 points or lose painfully because of an overturned catch by Dez Bryant on fourth down in the divisional round of the playoffs to the Green Bay Packers.
Garrett does not yell or scream on the practice field, but he can be salty.
"So f---ing ordinary," he said to no one and everyone on the second day of practice.
He called for a running back to be replaced because of a mistake and said, "We can't f---ing spoon feed it to you."
"We're just milling around," he said during a walk-through. "Just milling around. Let's go!"
He is at his most precise when it comes to late-game situations, quizzing players on both sides of the ball on time, score, down and distance. Garrett's precision in these situations is down to the second. It takes 18 seconds to run a mayday field goal. The offense can throw a pass in the middle of the field with 11 seconds and no timeouts and still get to the line to stop the clock with a spike.
"He's very much like the really good coaches I've been around -- John Robinson, Tony Dungy, Lovie Smith," Cowboys defensive coordinator Rod Marinelli said. "He's got that same toughness to him. What I love is the fundamentals. You want to be a sound football team. And the thing I just really love is I think he's a great field general on game day.
"If you look back, I think it was 13 of 16 games, one score in the fourth quarter. We won nine of the 13. That's not a playcall. It's how you use your team, when the running game comes, when you play good red zone defense, two-minute, all the situational football. That's the part I love. He excels at that stuff. And we believe in him."
The future
Ultimately, it matters how much Jones believes in him. The owner has offered no concrete definition of what Garrett has to do to be the team's head coach in 2020, which will lead to speculation about New Orleans Saints coach Sean Payton returning to the Cowboys, or Lincoln Riley leaving Oklahoma or defensive passing-game coordinator Kris Richard earning a promotion.
Stephen A. Smith says Jason Garrett still being in Dallas limits the Cowboys' expectations and explains why Pittsburgh and Cleveland are under more pressure.
In 2014, Garrett was in a similar spot. Coming off three consecutive 8-8 finishes that set a narrative he has not been able to shake, he was entering the final year of his contract. The Cowboys finished 12-4, won a playoff game and saw their season come to a painful end after Bryant's catch was overturned.
Jones likes it when people around him are in a prove-it situation that he never has to endure as the general manager because he is the owner.
Which brings it back to that training camp news conference and the whirring sound of the drill. One question after Jones acted like he did not hear what was asked about Garrett's future, he offered his support.
"There's no secret that the guy to my right here, I want to be the head coach of the Dallas Cowboys for as long as I'm around to spell it," Jones said. "That would be my goal. And that's no secret, and many of you have written about it in various ways. So let's see what's ahead."