The Kansas City Chiefs spent Tuesday down in Atlanta interviewing Falcons offensive coordinator Dirk Koetter and special teams coach Keith Armstrong for the club’s vacant head coaching job. On Wednesday, they hit the other end of the experience spectrum by talking to former Eagles head coach, Andy Reid, in Philadelphia.
Kansas City is one of seven current NFL teams looking to fill a head coaching vacancy since Romeo Crennel was fired on Monday.
Apparently the interview with Koetter went so well, he signed a contract extension with Atlanta today and agreed to not consider any more NFL head coaching vacancies. (Yes, that was sarcasm!)
Maybe Koetter ran for the hills because Chiefs owner Clark Hunt inexplicably took embattled general manager Scott Pioli down to Atlanta as part of the interview team? This is the same Pioli that Hunt has given a professional wedgie to since the season ended, taking away most of the power and authority that he had with the club previously. But he’s on the trip for interviewing the head coach after his last two hires went SO WELL for the Chiefs. (Oops! More sarcasm.)
Yep … it doesn’t get much stranger than the way the Chiefs conduct business since founder and owner Lamar Hunt died in 2006.
On Monday, during a series of interviews after Crennel’s firing, Hunt said that he would be doing the hiring for the head coach and that he would be interested in talking to former NFL head coaches, present college coaches, and present NFL coordinators. That’s a big group of potential candidates.
Former Chiefs beat writer, Jeffrey Flanagan, reported that Hunt may try to interview current New Orleans Saints offensive coordinator Pete Carmichael Jr. and St. Louis Rams offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer, both of whom are members of the so-called “Marty Schottenheimer Coaching Tree”. In Brian’s case, that is a literal statement since he is Marty’s son. Carmichael has worked with Marty several times in the past.
Though Chiefs fans should be thankful that Hunt won’t slam the doors on most candidates, the thinking here is that Hunt should do everything he can to sign a Reid, Jon Gruden, Lovie Smith, or the one name NOBODY is mentioning, Brian Billick, and leave the coordinators alone. (Bill Cowher? No way. According to some NFL insiders, the odds are less than 1% he comes to KC.)
The Chiefs are in such disarray (“Thanks, Pioli”) that Hunt will have to hit his next hire out of the park or weekly attendance at games may fall to 1980’s levels. Hunt should be asking Reid, Gruden, Smith or Billick how much it would cost to hire them and then go from there. The Saints just saw how big of a difference Sean Payton’s suspension for “Bountygate” made in their season, and they responded by making him the highest-paid coach in the league to keep him around.
For most Chiefs fans, hiring the latest flavor of the month (can you say, “Todd Haley”?) is something they don’t want to take a chance on THIS time. Before Koetter took his name out of the running for any job, he was one of the hotter names being thrown around for a head coaching job, along with Schottenheimer and Denver Broncos offensive coordinator, Mike McCoy.
Koetter was pretty much a bust in Jacksonville as an offensive coordinator and in 2011, produced one of the worst offenses in NFL history. However, because his buddy Mike Smith, the Falcons coach, gave him the keys to an offense with Matt Ryan, Julio Jones, Roddy White, and Tony Gonzalez, all of a sudden he’s hot. McCoy has Peyton Manning at QB, so how much is he REALLY doing as an O-coordinator? Maybe he just brings Peyton his coffee and honey buns before the offensive meetings?
Brian Schottenheimer has parlayed an internship with Steve Spurrier at the University of Florida and his respected last name into several offensive jobs and none of them showed notable accomplishments. NY Jets fans practically rioted to get him out of town after last year as the offensive coordinator, and the Rams were 23rd in offense last year. Not bad, but not exactly a “WOW!” candidate.
Here’s hoping the Chiefs have a new head coach by this time next week and that it’s a name that will make fans say, “WOW!!!”
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Finally, on a much more serious note, here are two links for anyone that needs help with domestic violence and/or sexual assault. The first link is the Kansas Coalition against sexual & domestic violence and the second link is the Missouri Coalition Against Domestic & Sexual Violence. Or, you can call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or the National Sexual Assault Hotline, 1-800-656-4673.
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