I think this is a bit of a false dilemma. Wilson would have to be an absolute lunatic to come into his next HC relationship like a diva. If he’s not humbled by this season, then he’s an unsalvageable sociopath. And I’m not aware of Russ coming out and saying he doesn’t want to roll out or make plays outside the pocket. As he slows down it will become somewhat inevitable but he’s not there yet. He’s not Aaron Rodgers and that’s probably 50% of the problem with him and Hackett.
Sean Payton is going to meet with the team. Certainly, he’s got the credentials to tell Wilson to STFU when needed and he’ll get a contract as big as Wilson’s dead cap number. Even if a new coach and Wilson come to loggerheads that doesn’t mean the Broncos have to cut him, they can just make him the backup and wait him out. So, it doesn’t have to be a “9 figure” cap hit even in a catastrophic situation.
Ironically, Payton has always had a pocket passing oriented offense. He also built it around fellow short guy, Drew Brees. It’d be interesting to see how that combo looked.
Another factor is that Russell loves Drew Brees. Drew was his role model, especially after they played together and bonded at Russell’s first Pro Bowl. I bet he’ll have respect for Sean who was Drew’s HC for so long.
Arizona HC Kliff Kingsbury and GM Steve Keim are done.
Through 2021, Kingsbury’s teams went 42-20-1 in the first seven games and 17-44 after.
Yikes!
Another offense guy who fails to bring the offense. Granted, not a ton to work with in Arizona, especially with Murray out, but they weren’t exactly lighting up the league with him, either. They spent on free agents at the skill positions but failed to address the O-line, a very common mistake almost every team makes.
Kingsbury failed upward, mostly thanks to Patrick Mahomes, whom he coached in college. How he got an NFL head coaching gig after being fired from a mediocre Texas Tech program (he was 35-40) is beyond me.
It will be interesting to see how the new coach handles Kyler Murray. Reading tea leaves, it seems to me that Kyler has way too much Johnny Manziel/playground QB in him and not a whole lot of coachability to run an NFL system. It will be interesting to see how he does.
I was down on Kyler from the day he was draft prospect. Kliff publicly married himself to Kyler the day he was hired by being such a vocal supporter pre-draft, so hearing that their relationship went south should make his firing not at all surprising. What’s really surprising was that the Cardinals decided to pay Kyler a fat stack of cash knowing that he and Kliff were at odds, his work ethic was questionable, and they hadn’t really put it together on the field. Like…what did they see that convinced them this was option was better than the franchise tag?
Jerry Jones insists that, if the Cowboys were to lose to the Buccaneers in the wild-card round this weekend (which would be a second straight first-round playoff exit), coach Mike McCarthy’s job would not be in jeopardy. Pardon me if I’m a bit skeptical.
Indeed; I wonder what the average number of Scaramuccis which pass in between an owner or GM giving a coach a “vote of confidence,” and then firing said coach.
Eh, McCarthy has done a fine job this year. I can’t recall any choke jobs or spectacularly bad game management which cost them games this season. Most of the podcasters I’ve heard have mostly conceded that McCarthy earned his way off the hot seat this season. Dak is another story, but you know how that goes.
Unless the Cowboys lose specifically because of an obvious coaching blunder (always a possibility with McCarthy) I’d say his job is as safe as anyone’s this season.
He held onto Jason Garrett for longer than any sane person should have. I’m not sure it’s fair to call him capricious. What was the last rash decision we can lay at his feet?
I think he’s gotten sentimental. He has hung onto a lot of players over the last 5-10 years that a more cutthroat GM might have shipped off. Tyron Smith. Zeke. Sean Lee. Witten and Romo in their later years.
I also think Jerry was a bit ahead of the curve on the explosion in WR value. He traded for Amari Cooper and got crushed for the capital he gave up. But in retrospect that was a solid deal.
A friend of mine is a Lovie Smith fan from back in his Bears days, and he’s of the opinion that Houston fired Smith because the Texans won their last two games when they were supposed to lose and secure the first pick in the draft.
His reasoning: Despite their crappy overall talent level, the Texans got a lot stronger over the second half of the season, playing good teams close and winning their last two. Ordinarily, management would see that as evidence of excellent coaching and be happy to retain that coach, but in this case the opposite happened. We’re talking about the Texans here, so I can totally see them issuing Smith a lose-or-else edict.
They were going to fire him this season no matter what, just like they fired David Culley last season.
Unfortunately, Smith, like Culley before him, did a better job than they really wanted despite the poor win-loss record, so it came out looking worse than they wanted. People were saying almost exactly 1 year ago that Lovie Smith was being set up for a 1 and done.
Actually, I did say that about 11 months ago:
The scuttlebutt last season (and the season before) was they wanted Josh McCown but that plan got torpedoed by the Flores lawsuit. I wouldn’t be shocked if they either went with another obvious 1 year hiring or went straight to McCown.
Then again, Jack Easterby is out now and Caserio seems to have a bit firmer control, so maybe they’re actually looking for a real coach of the future this time. Seems to be mainly Cal McNair who is fighting against the better candidates and there’s not a lot of use fighting the owner on stuff like that.
Agreed. Lovie was a guy it felt like the Texans hired because they had no other choice. During their coaching search the public perception was that they couldn’t give the job away. Lovie wasn’t on anyone’s radar as a head coaching candidate after flopping hard at Illinois.
I’m sure winning the last couple games made giving him the axe less of a mixed decision. If anything, it’s the other way around. Smith won those games because he knew he was getting canned.
In other news…
Don’t know how much this will impact the play on the field. He didn’t pick the GM or Head Coach, but there’s no reason to think that his hiring would change their status at this point. Maybe they’ll end up with a slightly shorter leash should the fuck up this ideal offseason situation.
Dude did a pretty good job running the Big Ten, I suspect figuring out the stadium situation will be at the top of his to do list. If they do bolt to Arlington Heights, building out McCaskeyland will be a full-time job.
Warren, like his predecessor, won’t have anything to do with football operations. His job 1 (as you mention) will be getting that stadium built. Job 1.5 may be overseeing the ownership transition when Virginia McCaskey dies.
The head coach and GM answer directly to Chairman George McCaskey.