The Cowboys stink. That’s a given.

In the aftermath of each loss, the powers-that-be offer up excuses and explanations aimed in part at making the players believe — and in part at making the customers believe.

After Monday night’s 34-10 loss to the Texans, which officially makes the Team formerly known as America’s not even the best little franchise in Texas, coach Mike McCarthy had some strange things to say.

“We deserve to win,” McCarthy told reporters. “We deserve the opportunity to win. And that’s why I’m putting the best people out there, and right now they’re young . . . but we need to do whatever the hell we need to do to win.”

Mike, you don’t deserve to win. No one deserves to win. You deserve a chance to win, that’s it.

And you’ve gotten 10 of them so far this year. But you’ve been outscored in five home games, 187-69. That’s on you and your team.

Players hear what coaches say. What do they think about the coach saying they “deserve” to win?

It might have been a throwaway line from a guy who just wanted to sound Steel City tough, end the press conference, and go home. It also might have been important insight into McCarthy’s apparent failure to be as detail-oriented as he needs to be.

Remember when the Packers blew out the Cowboys in the playoffs and McCarthy said no one saw it coming? McCarthy is the one who needed to see it coming, so that he could come up with ways to prevent it from happening. And he should have been up late every night obsessing over the various ways things could go haywire against a supposedly overmatched team.

So, no, the Cowboys don’t deserve to win. No team deserves to win. In any sport. At any level.

Fans don’t deserve to win, either. But here’s what they do deserve. They deserve coaches who don’t believe the team deserves to win, much less say it out loud.

They deserve coaches who know that the only way to win a game is to go take it.