Are you excited about the Bills coaching search?
Me neither.
Somehow the toxic environment in Buffalo’s front office has a way of draining away any possible enthusiasm.
When the man – in this case, general manager Doug Whaley – running the seach, by his very presence poisons the job pool, you just know this won’t end well.
Tom Coughlin, who won two Super Bowls in 12 years with the Giants while wearing a face that looked as if he’d just bitten into a lemon, was actually floated as a possible choice for the Bills.
Please stiffle your laughter.
Do you think, at age 70, Coughlin would take a job working for a GM who wants total control of the roster and, though he denies it, apparently didn’t get along with Buffalo’s previous two head coaches?
Tellingly, he took an adminstrative job with the Jaguars on Monday.
Jim Schwartz, now the Eagles defensive coordinator and holding that same position for Doug Marrone in 2014, transformed Buffalo’s ‘D’ into pass-rushing demons who led the league in sacks and were fourth in the NFL in both fewest points and yards surrendered.
Marrone walked away, in part, because of his discomfort with Whaley and Schwartz, who Rex Ryan eventually dismissed, was all too familiar with the political landscape in the Bills front office.
You haven’t heard Schwartz’s name even suggested.
Nor has the team said a word about Philadelphia’s offensive coordinator, Frank Reich, an iconic hero to Bills fans, who served nine years as Hall of Fame quarterback Jim Kelly’s caddy, producing some of the most dramatic victories as a backup QB in NFL history.
There’s a thought that with Reich still having a number of friends in and around the Buffalo organization, he’s been warned to avoid the job … which may be why he hasn’t even been interviewed by his former team, though he’d clearly be a popular choice.
Now, with Marrone having resigned and Ryan being fired, Buffalo is looking for its ninth head coach in 18 seasons, if you count Perry Fewell’s 7-game interim stint.
But this time, the candidates seem to be the “hot” coordinators, mostly unknown to casual Bills fans, and whose celebrity escalates or evaporates depending upon the performance of their teams.
Interviewed, so far, have been former Bills offensive coordinator and current interim coach Anthony Lynn plus Cardinals offensive coordinator Harold Goodwin and two defensive coordinators, Sean McDermott (Carolina) and Kris Richard (Seattle).
Not exactly a quartet that has you rushing out to renew your season tickets.
Nothing wrong with coordinators earning head-coaching jobs, of course, but it’s risky.
Being the boss of an NFL team requires a period of transition. The media responsibilities alone can be overwhelming, so can being the face of the franchise, to say nothing for hiring a staff which can carry out the coach’s vision.
Sometimes it works … 38-year-old Adam Gase went from being the Bears offensive coordinator to coaching the Dolphins and took Miami to the playoffs in his first year. Ben McAdoo did the same with the Giants.
Sometimes, it doesn’t … Doug Pederson struggled in his first season with Philadelphia and Jim Tomsula never even got a second year with San Francisco.
At least, we’re not hearing about some touted college coach.
More than a few Bills fans wanted their team to hire Oregon’s Chip Kelly in 2013, when it settled for Marrone, the former Syracuse boss who went 15-17 in two seasons. At that point, he tired of the front office machinations and chuckled all the way to the credit union with a $4 million check for not coaching in 2015, the product of a brilliantly structured contract by Buffalo’s “brain trust.”
When it comes to hiring “name” college coaches in the NFL, think Kelly, fired twice in four years (Eagles and 49ers), Nick Saban, who lied about taking the job in Alabama even as he steered the Dolphins to a 15-17 mark in two seasons, and Steve Spurrier, eight games under .500 in two years with the Redskins.
Whaley seems to be carefully pruning the coaching list to coordinators who would be so happy to have the job that they wouldn’t challenge his demand to have complete control of the roster.
Indeed, even Ryan agreed to that … though it was his call which 47 of the 53 players were active on game day.
It would be interesting to hear Russ Brandon’s take on all this.
The managing partner and president of the Bills, who also holds the latter title with the Sabres, isn’t a football personnel guy, but he has repeatedly shown vast marketing skills.
Sources familiar with Ryan’s hiring indicate it was Brandon who suggested to owners Terry and Kim Pegula that they not let Rex “leave the building,” after his interview.
Ryan never loses a press conference or an interview and Brandon immediately recognized a golden marketing tool when he saw one.
Rex was the reason the Bills sold a franchise-record of over 61,000 season tickets in 2015.
And by the time the fan base realized Ryan was more talk than defensive talent, Brandon had been promoted to Chief Operating Office of Pegula Sports and Entertainment.
Thus it falls upon Whaley, whose fingerprints are all over this mess, to pick a coach who can save his job.
But he’s at cross purposes … he doesn’t want to relinquish roster control, so that all but eliminates former NFL coaches and leaves him with the coordinator dice-roll.
Throughout the franchise’s 57 years, it has had 18 head coaches, including Fewell.
Lou Saban actually coached two different stints, so did Harvey Johnson, first as an interim, then as the boss.
During the Bills existence, nine of their head coaches – exactly half – had previously held that position in the NFL: Saban (Patriots, Broncos), John Rauch (Raiders), Johnson (Bills), Chuck Knox (Rams), Marv Levy (Chiefs), Wade Phillips (Broncos), Dick Jauron (Bears), Chan Gailey (Cowboys) and Ryan (Jets).
Saban, Knox, Levy and Phillips all took Buffalo to the playoffs multiple times.
But from what we can gather, there’s nobody with “NFL head coach” on his resume being considered by the Bills.
It’s not hard to guess why.
And for every day that goes by, the pressure mounts on Doug Whaley … and that’s way overdue.
(Chuck Pollock, the Times Herald sports editor, can be reached at cpollock@oleantimesherald.com)
