By Kris Mead
Hue “Clueless” Jackson is no longer on the Browns’ sideline,
but he is still on America’s televisions. Hue has committed to, what seems to
be, a cross-country “tell all.” Hue has essentially made it his destiny to not
take any responsibility for leading a team to a defeated season. For instance,
Hue has stated that if it weren’t for his bosses, he would have drafted Patrick
Mahomes, Carson Wentz, Jared Goff, Deshaun Watson, or any other halfway decent
quarterback presently finding success in the NFL. As for the Browns’ former
offensive coordinator, Todd Haley, he seems to have crawled under a rock until
some desperate team exhausts all other offensive options and must make a deal
with the “devil.” So, now the Browns are being stopgap led by a man more famous
for being fired by the New Orleans Saints for instilling an immoral and illegal
bounty system while acting as their defensive coordinator - Greg Williams. Therefore,
the obvious question is who do the Browns hire as their new head coach?
Many have discussed hiring Lincoln Riley, the University of
Oklahoma and Baker Mayfield’s former college coach, while others have suggested
a more practical hire, but extremely contingent upon how the Packer’s do the
rest of this season, in Mike McCarthy. Although the latter is more probable,
neither represents the recent trend in NFL coach hiring NFL.
The trend in hiring NFL head coaches has consisted of four
elements: (1) The coach is young (under 45) (2) has NFL coaching experience but
(3) does not have NFL head coaching experience and (4) is offensively minded
(more importantly, quarterback minded). These criteria represent the new head
coaches who are finding success in the NFL – Sean McVay, Kyle Shannahan
(granted his quarterback is out), and Matt Nagy.
The other item to note is who is doing the hiring. In this
case it is John Dorsey, who studied under Ron Wolf. Wolf is famous for hiring
Mike Holmgren to be the head coach of the Packers. In turn, look to see Dorsey
go after a coach who has connections to Mike Holmgren’s coaching tree (i.e.
people connected to Andy Reid, head coach of the Kansas City Chiefs, or Mike
McCarthy). There is also a chance that Dorsey goes after a coach who is
tailored to coaching quarterbacks with similar skill sets as Baker Mayfield –
short, mobile, strong arms and accurate. In other words, someone who coached
Drew Brees could be the next Browns head coach. There is a greater chance that
he will go for both.
The following coaches are likely candidates to become the
next Browns’ head coach: Mike McCarthy, Bruce Arians, and Eric Bieniemy. However, my dark horse pick to be the next
Cleveland Browns head coach is Peter Edwards Carmichael Jr.
Carmichael has been with the New Orleans Saints since 2006 –
the same year that Drew Brees arrived in New Orleans. Carmichael is credited
with developing Drew Brees, after his dreadful injury with the Chargers, into
the magnificent quarterback he is today. More importantly, Carmichael managed
to take a shorter quarterback and make him into a future Hall of Famer. It is
also important to mention Carmichael has always studied the offensive side of
the ball and made New Orleans one of the most prolific offenses. The Saints led
the league in offense both in 2008 and 2009 and have finished in the top six
NFL offenses for the past twelve years. Finally, Carmichael has connections to
the Mike Holmgren coaching tree. Carmichael coached under Ray Rhodes, Holmgren’s
defensive coordinator (1992-1993) and eventually the Packers head coach (1999),
as Rhodes’ Philadelphia Eagles’ quarterbacks coach (1997-1998). So, combine the
fact that Carmichael meets the criteria (except for the age requirement) with
the fact that Carmichael has links to Dorsey’s preferable coaching style, in
Mike Holmgren, and it seems to be a good fit. More importantly, if Baker
Mayfield is the Browns best quarterback in the last twenty years, it makes
sense to find him a coach who was capable in developing the greatest “short”
quarterback to ever step foot on the NFL gridiron.
The NFL is a copycat league.
If offensive minded coaches are the trend in the NFL, Carmichael is as
good a pick as any. Hopefully Dorsey will agree.
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