I could absolutely see a team which has a history of making foolish, strange, shoot-from-the-hip management decisions – and by that, I mean the Raiders and the Browns – taking a flyer on Belichick.
Just wondering if Mike Tomlin would reconsider if the Bills came calling.
He’s under contract with the Steelers so the Bills would probably have to trade for him
Even if he wasn’t, they just got rid of a coach who, since 2017, has better regular regular and post-season W-L records than Tomlin and got Buffalo its first post-season win since the 90s - and that was before Josh Allen.
Buffalo’s run defense could use some work but their bigger problems seems to be the WRs are not the greatest and Allen has to play hero ball all too often to make up for it. Maybe Tomlin can bring something on the defense but I can’t see what he brings in terms of the offense to ease the burden on Allen. I see them as more on the market for an offensive coach and maybe one on the younger side, i.e. take a few risks on new blood. The experienced coaches on the market are decidedly not an upgrade over who they just fired.
Stay away from Klint Kubiak, Buffalo. He’s ours.
You can have Klay though, that’s acceptable.
And a good DC gets a chance. He was a head coach at Boston College.
Here’s another stab at McDermott, which came across my X feed:
Four teams in the Superbowl Era have won a playoff game in 6 straight seasons.
1991-1996 Cowboys (Won 3 Super Bowls)
2011-2018 Patriots (Won 3 Super Bowls)
2018-2024 Chiefs (Won 3 Super Bowls)
2020-2025 Bills (did not play in a single Super Bowl)
FOMO is real.
Three positions filled and yet coaches from the eliminated division round teams could only have in-person interviews starting today and the coaches from the winning teams next week. Not that Hafley is a bad choice but given the roughly 2 decades of mediocrity in Miami, maybe spend the extra time on an important decision?
As the linked article pointed out, the new GM, Jon-Eric Sullivan, was in the front office at Green Bay for the past couple of years. He’s bringing in a guy who he knows.
The Packers resigning LaFluer and losing Haffley is probably the optimal outcome for the Bears and the rest of the NFCN.
There are long shots, and then there’s Brady and Belichick voluntarily reuniting with Brady in the power position in the relationship.
Belichick to the Bills would kind of be funny as he coaches a third AFCE team. The Bills with Allen are the “a good coach away” from a Super Bowl team (in their minds anyways) so they feel like the right landing spot out of all the openings. The fly in the ointment being that Belichick has apparently completely lost the plot and has devolved into a Bravo reality show. The headlines would be kind of wild though.
At 24, his girlfriend is younger than most of the players, so maybe he can relate to the new generation 
I get the ‘why’ but still, “I know a guy” is a heck of a way to pick a key employee.
Maybe, just maybe, it’d be a good idea to do some non-token interviews with a broader range of candidates, including one or two they don’t personally know.
It might even be better than hoping the success these people had elsewhere will magically rub off in Miami under different circumstances and ownership.
This reminds me, is the Rooney rule still a thing? It seems like both the Giants and Falcons zeroed in on a single candidate and immediately hired their first choice.
Yes, it is. As per the NFL’s website:
Edit: in the Giants’ case, they did in-person interviews with Raheem Morris and Antonio Pierce, as well as Kevin Stefanski and Mike McCarthy.
https://www.npr.org/2026/01/17/g-s1-106420/harbaugh-ny-giants-coach-ravens
You and I both know that it’s a lot more than just knowing each other.
In other news, Matt Nagy is officially out as OC in KC. And the new OC will be a familiar face to Chiefs fans, Eric Bieniemy.
I’m not a huge supporter of Bieniemy as an OC, but this will probably be an important loss for the Bears. Our running game took a huge step forward under him. Hopefully Ben Johnson can backfill that without any regression on the field. EB feels more like a vibes and attitude guy than a Xs and Os guy,
There were rumors that Nagy was an HC candidate this cycle. Wonder if him getting canned undermines that or not. Part of me wonders if the Chiefs were hoping Nagy would have accepted a job by now making this transition feel less contentious.
There’s definitely a lot of open jobs and as much as people like to trash Nagy, his record in Chicago wasn’t that bad. He did a hell of a lot more with Trubisky and Fields than anyone else has.
I may have missed it in this thread, but I have to say that I’m pretty intrigued by what the Falcons have done this offseason.
The first unexpected move was this.
They created a new Team President role for the recently retired QB. Lots of industry peeps seem kind of pissed at Arthur Blank for this, criticizing the move because they don’t think Ryan has done anything to earn such a lofty position. Certainly the track record for gifting executive positions to franchise players with no experience isn’t awesome.
Ryan was running the Head coaching search because.
And the GM position remains vacant as of today.
Ryan’s first move was.
Many people considered Stefanski one of the top available candidates after failing in Cleveland. I think it’s fair to suggest that Stefanski wasn’t the problem there. He was saddled with Deshaun Watson, by most accounts against his will, along with his associated albatross contract and lost trade assets. He was also apparently forced to draft Shedeur this pass offseason created an unnecessary QB controversy.
Atlanta’s top priority will be figuring out their own QB situation following the failed Cousins and Penix investments, but I have to think that Ryan promised Stefanski that he’d be completely in charge of that. Will be interesting to see if Kevin can get this one right, if it turns into another quagmire he won’t escape criticism this time.
Finally, Stefanski has made his first big decision.
The Falcons defense has long been a problem but they made a lot of positive strides under Ulbrich. Ulbrich seemed to be a innocent bystander in the Jets fiasco 2 years ago and landed on his feet in Atlanta. Them retaining him and pairing him with Stefanski makes a ton of sense.
Ryan being inexperienced and them not hiring a GM before their HC are certainly red flags, but this definitely feels like a conscious plan taking shape.
He’s supposedly still the leading candidate in Tennessee.
There are many more factors than an OC, of course, but the Chiefs scored a lot more points with Bienemy as OC than Nagy.
| Bienemy | Season | Points |
|---|---|---|
| 2018 | 565 | |
| 2019 | 451 | |
| 2020 | 473 | |
| 2021 | 480 | |
| 2022 | 496 | |
| Nagy | Season | Points |
| 2023 | 371 | |
| 2024 | 385 | |
| 2025 | 362 |
Those stops in Washington and UCLA are pretty damning. EB should probably feel grateful that he can snuggle up again under the cozy feathers of Andy Reid and Pat Mahomes.
Did Nagy cause that regression when he wasn’t calling plays or setting the game plan? Or was it the fact that Mahomes’ massive contract kicked in, they jettisoned Tyreek and have had a motley WR and RB room pretty much non-stop since, and Reid/Kelce are getting old?
I think Nagy has hinted in interviews that if he gets another gig, it won’t be as the primary play caller. One of his learnings from Chicago is that he needs to share more responsibility and be more of an executive. Will be interesting if he lands that Titans job with Cam Ward under center.
The loss of Tyreek was a huge factor in the Chiefs regression, IMO.
And drafting Clyde Edwards-Helaire instead of Jonathon Taylor, of course.