Generally, when there’s talk about interest in hiring you as a coordinator before you’re even fired as a head coach, it’s a sign that you’re seen as a good football mind. It might even be a sign that the team you’re about to be fired from ought to rethink things. Clearly you’re in demand, and maybe you can still be the person who turns things around where you are, with some offseason adjustments that aren’t fully cleaning house.
Or, perhaps, the talk is that the clownshoes Jacksonville Jaguars want to hire you. Well, maybe not the Jaguars, but their “unpopular” and “beleaguered” — as described by CBS Sports’ headline writer and writer Jason La Canfora, respectively — general manager, Trent Baalke.
“Jaguars GM Trent Baalke a big supporter of Bill O’Brien, proposes pairing him with Vic Fangio as DC” is definitely a combination of words — one that really suggests Baalke ought to be on his way out of Jacksonville. Of course, why Baalke is employed to run an NFL team in the first place is a valid question, but one answered easily enough: It’s the Jaguars.
At least as a defensive coordinator, Fangio wouldn’t be in position to make a decision like he did on Saturday, kicking a field goal on fourth-and-9 with 4:41 left in the fourth quarter to cut Denver’s deficit against Kansas City to four points. The Broncos never touched the ball again, lost 28-24, the 13th straight win for Kansas City in the rivalry, and maybe the end of Fangio’s three-year tenure with a 19-30 record and no playoff appearances.
As for his resume running a defense, Fangio has presided over elite units in Chicago and San Francisco (where he worked for Baalke, natch), but also brutally bad ones in Indianapolis and Houston.
Dan Quinn has had a renaissance as a defensive coordinator with the Cowboys after flaming out as the Falcons’ head coach, so it’s not like considering Fangio for a coordinator job right after an unsuccessful stint coaching the Broncos is lunacy. But it also is a decision that Baalke shouldn’t be making, and especially a decision that Baalke shouldn’t be making based on whose phone numbers he personally has.
The long goodbye
The problem with announcing before the season that it’s your last one is that everyone knows. So, Jim Larrañaga and the Miami Hurricanes showed up at Cameron Indoor Stadium knowing that it was their last time seeing Mike Krzyzewski on the Duke bench there.
And now everyone knows that Coach K lost his last home game against Miami.
Miami is 13-3 and leads the ACC with a 5-0 conference record and nine straight wins overall. Perhaps Larrañaga’s Hurricanes should be ranked?
[UPDATE: 10:32 am]
Welp.