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Fantasy Championship game. That's what it's doing. Patriots. It's gone. The Rams win it.
Today's guests, NFL Network Insider Tom Pellisero, Fox Sports NFL analyst Mark Schleret, plus latest news and more. And now, it's Rich Eisen. Hour number two of the Rich Eisen Show is on the air. Tom Pellicero, my colleague from NFL Network, will join us in about 20 minutes' time to tell us why. Today's news day started with a firing in Buffalo.
with the uh firing of Sean McDermott after nine years. And that's coming up on this program. 844-204-Rich is the number to dial here on the show. Phone lines are lit. We're going to.
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Hit your RSS feed or the Rich Eisen Show YouTube channel, youtube.com/slash Rich Eisen Show. When this show came on the air an hour ago, we're already 50,000 views in to that. video version of it. We always appreciate that.
Now then. Let's get to what I thought we were going to be talking about off the top of the show before I heard about Bo Nix's broken ankle. And before Sean McDermott got fired, and before the rest of the playoff weekend played out. And that's the officiating in Denver, Colorado. towards the end of that football game.
Now then, I'm I'm wondering if I should pick on the The Um other stuff first, the more obvious stuff first. And that is the two pass interference calls that were called on the Buffalo Bills in the final throws of that game. First things first. the tray white pass interference that occurred inside the five yard line that Bo Nick's through on a pass, with his ankle apparently already broken. And uh I appreciate my Buffalo Bills Coordinating producer Bills Mafioso himself, Mike Hoskins, choosing a photograph where the ball is already in Mims' hands, but.
Trey White, in my mind, made contact well before Mims was trying for that catch, and And to me, I thought This was 100%. Pass interference, and I can't find another person, even though you're making that, I can't see it look, TJ. You are, if you're if you're making that look about this past interference, you are the only individual I have met yet. I'm the only one? That is correct.
Social media was filled with. I understand.
Social media was filled with a lot of emotional people because previously. There was a pass interference call. on the bills. that 100% was not Pass interference. And I understand that led to a lot of emotions flying that this moment right here.
This moment right here was like a cherry on top, a coup de grace. I thought 100% Trey White interfered with him. got there way too early. And then the He did get his money's worth, at least, when he got a 15-yard penalty, since it was only half the distance to the goal after that. But the past interference call that happened earlier one hundred percent wasn't pass interference, but Bills fans, all it did was cost you two extra yards of field position because Joey Bosa.
Absolutely shoved Bo Nix over. In the pocket, well, after the ball was gone, for a roughing the passer penalty that Denver declined because the pass interference penalty that. They accepted was a seventeen yard It wasn't some massive spot foul like the Trey White one. All it was, it cost you two yards of field position.
So that's my opinion on all of that.
Now there were also two miss calls. Two. On top of it, I thought Brandon Cooks was interfered with by Riley Moss at the end of regulation. I thought that that 100% He would Riley Moss had grabbed his arm.
Now was the ball catchable or not? I, you know, that was before that was that could have been a spot foul in the end zone, and 100%. a couple of tush pushes maybe away from this being a a victory. for the Buffalo Bills. I thought Moss 100% grabbed Cooks' arm and restricted him.
And then another missed call. That would have negated the conversation we're just about to have about what a simultaneous catch is or not. And also would have left, to be very honest with you, Bo Nix's ankle intact. is if The officials called Holding on the Buffalo Bills offensive line. in overtime as the first ever walk-off Safety on a holding call in playoff history.
Because the Bills were pinned right against their own goal line, Allen fading back into the end zone before he took off. to get some better field position for the Bills, no doubt. You take a look at it, there is a hold. Right there on the goal line.
So Just want to get that all off my chest and out of the way before we talk about this play with Brandon Cooks. and Jaquan McMillan.
So To me At first blush, I thought this was a cook's catch. And then McMillan comes out of the pile with the football, and they rule it at interception. I thought when we were going to see the instant replay, the ball was clearly popped out of. Cooks's hands and Macmillan grabbed it. But that wasn't the case.
And you look at this and you could see Cooks having both hands on the ball here. And McMillan having no hands on the ball here, just a hand on Cooks's. Right shoulder. and a hand on Cooks's left arm. Meaning he's getting set to snatch this football away from him.
Which he did. as they were down on the ground.
Now the question is This is what it's all about. Was Cooks a runner? Or was he somebody in the process of making the catch going to the ground? If he was a runner, If he was a runner, Then he would be down by contact. if he was going down to the ground in the process of making a catch, This is an interception.
You understand how if you're a runner. The ground cannot cause a turnover. If you're going down to the ground. the ground can cause an incompletion, and if the ball never hits the ground, it can also lead to an interception. And To me, looking at it again, it looked like Cooks was somebody in the process of making the catch.
Now, Mooch pointed out to Walt Anderson, who came on NFL Game Day Morning on Sunday morning. to talk about it from the NFL's officiating point of view. that he thought two feet down and then a knee constituted a third step or a football act. that would on the spot Make Cooks a runner, having completed the process of the catch before he hit the ground. and the way that the officials viewed it.
Reviewing it? They didn't see it that way. They saw it. Cooks is going to the ground. He has to survive the ground.
He not only didn't survive the ground, he didn't survive Macmillan. And that's the way I see it when I'm. Looking at it. The one criticism I think that. is warranted.
And also needs to be pointed out. Is that the process of making this ruling and making us aware of it. Stunk. That's there's no other way to put it. That's facts.
That The NFL is the leader. In sports. North American sports may be around the globe. Rulings to the fans in the stands and the fans at home. to the point where you guys remember i was Begging Major League Baseball for years to put.
Mike's On the umpire to describe to everybody. At home. And in the stands, what had just been reviewed? Instead, they were using, you know, like safe. And out.
The umps would just walk to home plate, make a symbol. Make a symbol. and then be done. and go back about their business. And you're sitting at home saying, wait the why did you Think it was safe.
Why did you think it was out? They're now explaining it. Basketball officials. at both levels, all levels. Are now going to a microphone on a scorers table.
and explaining to people. This is what we have reviewed. This is the ruling. This is why we're saying it. They're taking the NFL's lead.
And for whatever reason. We never heard from Carl Sheffers. After further review, We never saw him run over to a Monitor for him to look at it. Instead, it felt like it was being treated like a third-down spot in the second quarter of a week six game. And I'm sitting at home saying, This is the playoffs.
Like, can somebody explain to me? And I wasn't alone. An NFL head coach. Sadly, at the time, Yeah. Felt so compelled to get her.
An explanation, he fired off a timeout at overtime because, again, this is overtime. Sean McDermott couldn't throw a red flag. Everything comes from New York in terms of what you're reviewing, and apparently. They treated it like any expedited review. Which is we looked at it And if they're playing on.
It's been confirmed. That's it. And he's like, wait a minute, explain to me why we're playing on here. Give me a give me a give me a a little bit of a A chit-chat? Make some announcement Did you even look at it?
It went so damn fast Even he felt compelled to stop play to say what's up. It's hard for me to And I've had a chance to look at it, it's hard for me to understand why it was ruled the way it was ruled. And If it is ruled that way, then why wasn't it slowed down? Just to make sure. that we have this right.
That would have made a lot of sense to me to make sure that we have this thing right because that. That's a pivotal play in the game. We have the ball at the 20, maybe kicking a game-winning field goal right there. Um So I'll just leave it at that. But I'm saying it because I'm standing up for Buffalo.
Damn it. I'm standing up for us. Johnny, what went on is not that is not how it should go down. In my estimation, that place, these guys spend three hours out there playing football, pouring their guts out to not even. Say, hey, let's just slow this thing down.
That's why I'm bothered. Again, I'm wondering if the I'm standing up for Buffalo came from a point of view of him wondering if This was going to be one of his last times speaking in front of a microphone. Standing up for Buffalo, again, but that's... Maybe some hindsight. He couldn't have been more right, man.
And I'm sitting here wondering: did they move so fast because. This game was in overtime and Seattle and San Francisco were playing. Real that kickoff was coming up fast. They even pushed back the kickoff. I'm serious.
I'm wondering if that's like, hey, we... We looked at it, it's done. You think that that really is. Off we go, huh? Really think that.
I don't know. I have no idea. That's the problem, we're all grasping at straws, and when things are left for us to interpret. We fill the void with crazy thoughts. What I just said might be crazy.
But not as crazy as people thinking.
Well, the NFL has their thumb on the scale. for Denver. As if, you know what, anybody out there that thinks that the NFL had the thumb on the scale for Denver, it's like, okay, you know what? We could have, if we had our thumb on the scale for Denver, if that was the goal.
Okay. Could have ended the game on a holding call in the end zone on the spot a few minutes before, but no, no, no, no, no. We're going to wait for that simultaneous catch to hit. Then we're going to pounce. Oh, yeah.
That makes sense. Of course it doesn't. It doesn't. You saw a lot of that too. But why are we expediting?
Didn't you say in the bull report that they had to keep it moving?
Well, do we got the pool report, Hoskins? There it is. The receiver has to complete the process of the catch. He was going to the ground. Um And part of the process, the defender gained possession of it at that point.
The defender is the one that completed the process of the catch, and the defender was awarded the ball. I understand that. Did the ball at the ground? No, that was confirmed in the replay process. The interception was confirmed.
Again, if Macmillan wasn't around and the ball popped loose. We all, he didn't mean he didn't survive the ground. See, I kind of thought in real time it looked like an interception, and then it was the slow motion and the still photographs where it looked like a catch. No, I understand that, but the still photographs, there's many still photographs of him with the ball in his hand and his knee on the ground. Right.
But if he's not a runner, if he's going to the ground, he must, it doesn't matter that you've frozen that moment in time. He must now survive the ground. Right. There's a big difference there.
So you could freeze it in time and go, how is that? and interception. Macmillan doesn't have possession of it. Cooks does his knees on the ground, plays over, except for the fact if he's not a runner, if he's a runner, plays over. And that's why on the Sunday night game, When The ball got yanked out of Devontae Adams' hands only to be intercepted.
You know, Collinsworth's like, there's a lot of people in Buffalo that are looking at this because He was ruled a runner. He was ruled, he's already completed the process of the catch.
Now he's going down to the ground.
Now, you can have an argument whether that was, in fact, the case. But that's why the difference between the Sunday nighter not being a turnover for The Bears. and the Saturday afternoon eveninger. Being a turn a takeaway for the Broncos. But maybe is is there just a um Did we somehow, someway, find an Achilles heel in the system?
Of in overtime, when everything's being reviewed and it's expedited, it still needs to be explained. When you're in overtime, And there's a turnover. And it's in question as to whether it was, and it needed to be reviewed because all turnovers are reviewed. It's not like it wasn't reviewed. But people are wondering, was it?
Because it did not come. hand in hand with the usual Explanation. Stopping the game. Referee facing the camera. After further review, the play stands as called.
Even that would be like we looked at it And you could also say, or the play is confirmed. Brandon Cooks, the Buffalo receiver. Needed to complete the process of the catch. He was not a runner and therefore not down by contact. First down, Denver.
Then the coach doesn't feel compelled to fire off a timeout. And we're not all wondering, did you look at it? Why didn't you look at it longer? What was it? They didn't do it.
And again, I'm wondering why. Is it because we've just never really had something that controversial in a playoff overtime under the new rules? with new expedited reviews. They looked at it with all their millions of dollars that they spent on the Hawkeye equipment and saw it. And said, play on.
And everybody's like, whoa, wait a minute. Including the coach of the Bills. Play on? What are you talking about, play on? We don't even know what the play was.
Yet That's The issue. That needs to be rectified and addressed. Quite frankly. Before it happens again. in a championship game.
Now, even after all you did describing this, you understand how, like, the casual fan is still completely different. You know, it's still a confusion about what's a catch, what isn't a catch. You don't need a third step, you need just an act common to the game. How can you have a n act comedy of the game when you're flat on your back and you're getting the ball ripped out of your hands? You know?
So, if you don't have an act coming, if you haven't completed the process of the catch yet and you're going down to the ground, you must survive the ground, which he did not. He didn't survive Macmillan. But yeah. Mm-hmm. Gosh.
I know. I always find it funny when fans go, oh, that's fixed, right? Because Josh Allen is one of the faces of the league, right? I think we all agree. If you were going to say fix something, when you fix it for the face of your league, Bills fans are some of the most passionate fans.
You want them involved. Of course you do. You want to talk about narratives and stories the Bills are still alive? Come on, man. But that's what happens.
The void gets filled with nonsense.
So don't let the void get filled. Fill the void yourself with your own information. 844-204-RICH is the number to dial. Tom Pellicero when we come back. Your phone calls and so much more.
Oh, my goodness. We're not even halfway through this show. It's crazy. Yeah. The Rich Eisen Show Podcast.
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A free service exclusively at O'Reilly Auto Parts. Ladies and gentlemen, he was not supposed to be on this program, but as soon as Sean McDermott news broke, I'm like, we got to get Tommy P back on. Tom Palisero here from my NFL network. Friends and family, good to see you, Tom. How are you, sir?
Good to see you, Rich. Doing great. What's up to my boys in the studio? Hey, what's up, Tommy P, what up, man? Cracking.
Great to see you.
So, what happened? Tom, what happened in Western New York today? Sure. Short version of it, Rich. Sean McDermott was called into a meeting.
I got a call. Sean just went into a meeting. I got another call within seven minutes saying, Sean's been fired. It sounds like it was very brief. Essentially, you've done a fabulous job, but we need to make a change.
Terry Pagula reiterated that in his public statements. And it really comes down kind of similar to the Ravens' logic in moving on from John Harbaugh, which was they feel like this is a team that should be competing at the highest level. They've not achieved that highest level in terms of getting to a Super Bowl.
Now, Sean McDermott has won a lot more playoff games over his nine years in Buffalo than John Harbaugh has won in recent years. Sean won 106 games over nine seasons, if you include playoffs. He won at least one playoff game in like six consecutive years.
So this was a team that was always competing to be there at the end. But again, much like John Harbaugh, much like Mike Tomlin, who, of course, stepped down in Pittsburgh six days ago, which Feels like an eternity because of all the wheels and things that keep turning on a daily basis. Right now, there's times where owners simply feel like it's time. And I know that I said this on the show a couple of weeks ago: when one owner makes a move and then a second owner makes the move, there are other owners that are looking at this and going, well, hold on, if they're saying that's not good enough, why are we going to stand pat? You know, certainly with Sean McDermott, there were some frustrations that he had, and you saw it in terms of certain players who were inactive on game days, kind of a revolving door wide receiver and whatnot.
But ultimately, Terry Pagula not only decided to pick essentially Brandon Bean over Sean McDermott, he promoted Brandon Bean. He gave him a larger title. Brandon Bean is now going to lead the search for a new head coach. And also, the coaching staff is now going to report to Bean. Every team's reporting structure is different.
There are some that have the sort of two-pronged horizontal structure, in some cases, three-pronged. Everyone talks to The owner. That's what the Bills have had in recent years.
Now they have the classic vertical structure where it's coaching reports to the GM who reports to the owner. They are doing some things differently here. They want to be unified as an organization. Obviously, Terry Pagula didn't feel like that was the case down the stretch of the season. If they don't turn the football over, Five times if they don't have several borderline calls that people are still talking about go against them.
Do they go into the AFC Championship game? Does that save Sean McDermott? Is this what Steve Bashoti said? And that just would have saved him for one more week. I don't know.
I don't have those answers at this time right now. What we do know is the Bills now one of 10 teams making a head coaching change in this cycle. There are eight jobs currently available. This is a cycle that we went into knowing there weren't necessarily the Ben Johnson, Mike Vrabel, the shoe-in types of candidates. The ones who are getting jobs are the ones who just got fired.
It's John Harbaugh going to the Giants. It's DeFansky going to the Falcons. And now McDermott coming out there, he's not going to be the top candidate for every job, but certainly there are teams this morning, many of them in in-person interviews, who are monitoring this and having to recalibrate again as a highly accomplished NFL coach, at least in terms of his winning percentage and consistency, suddenly becomes available.
So is there any sort of inner workings underneath the... The ocean uh iceberg pieces uh about the bean McDermott relationship that you can lend potentially to Answer no doubt some Bills fans' questions as to why, if we're constantly talking about the weaponry around Josh Allen. That it's the coach that Is departing, and it is the man who's in charge of the roster getting promoted.
Well, here's what I'd say. Based upon their prior reporting structure, Sean McDermott also had significant say in terms of personnel. They were on a vertical or a horizontal plane in terms of both reporting directly to Terry Pagula. You know, Sean McDermott knew Brandon from Carolina. That was a part of the driving force, the alignment that they had.
But again, in recent weeks, it became apparent, even just by Sean McDermott's own words publicly, that he had certain levels of frustration. You know, whether it's Keon Coleman who just wasn't able to be active on game day, whether it was defensively and some back and forth in terms of who's calling the plays and whether or not they had the weaponry on that side. What we do know is this was a team that was good enough to be there at the end every single year. I have a hard time putting that loss to Denver on Sean McDermott because he didn't give the ball away five times. He didn't make those calls that he then vigorously defended at his post-game press conference.
But at the same time, there have been other examples in recent years. In terms of whether there were game management issues, whether there were other things that would fall in the bucket of coaching. Listen, he's made a lot of coordinator changes over the years. He's moved on from his defensive coordinator, his offensive coordinator. They've not yet been able to get over the hump into the Super Bowl.
And when you've got, as one coaching candidate put it to me this morning, the best player on the planet, not only does that make now this vacancy really attractive, but it also speaks to, as you're beginning to see, how quickly windows can close in the NFL. Nine years was apparently long enough that Terry Pagula felt like he needed to leave that window open. Tom Pellicero here on The Rich Eisen Show, what's the first blush list of candidates? I mean, we already know who's already out there interviewing for jobs, Tom. But what about this one?
Well, what I would tell you, Rich, is the people involved in making those decisions have been in closed-door meetings all morning. Every GM in the league has a list that they keep just in the event that something ends up changing here. I would say, in talking to people this morning around the NFL, other coaches and front office people and coaching agents who are watching the situation, there is a sense that the Bills may go on the offensive side of the ball with this hire, even though that offense has been really good, whether it was under Brian Dable or it was under Ken Dorsey or Joe Brady at various points. But having somebody who's kind of on the same page with Josh Allen and can grow that side together, that may be something alluring because he's never truly had that. I think that Joe Brady is a candidate.
I don't know that he is the candidate for the job, though he certainly has a close relationship with Josh. I would watch Davis Webb as a potential candidate for that position, a backup quarterback for several seasons in Buffalo who's really close. With Josh Allen. There's multiple teams that are waiting for Davis Webb to be available to interview again in a week. That's how close he is, even though he's not even the offensive coordinator in Denver.
He's a quarterbacks coach. He's going to have multiple opportunities for second interviews, depending if those jobs get filled before he's eligible to continue the interview process.
So I think that that name potentially could come up. If you're looking at some of the other popular names that are out on the circuit right now, I think Mike McDaniel is interviewed for practically every head coaching job and offensive coordinator job in the league. But given he was in Miami, they struggled to get past Buffalo. That one's probably a pretty hard sell. I do know this, Rich.
Everybody is going to be lining up for this job. Anyone who is a coaching candidate who has an opportunity to go and interview in Buffalo is going to race. They will fly themselves in. They will pay for their own per diem. There's no question whatsoever.
This is now the job. And the fact that several times we've had to redo that, you know, because Pittsburgh is also a great job. Baltimore is potentially. If you believe in Lamar Jackson, that you can get him healthy and get him playing like Lamar again. Those are three rare, rare jobs.
Two places with former MVPs, plus a place in Pittsburgh that has so much consistency. That also speaks, Rich, I think, to if we talk about where could Sean McDermott potentially land next. It doesn't make a ton of sense for him to go into a total rebuild. He's 51 years old. He's been there every year, been in the playoffs every season here in recent years.
I don't really see him going to, I'm going to go to Arizona or I'm going to go to Las Vegas. I think the team's to watch for Sean McDermott. Potentially the Steelers, though that would be outside of their normal bucket in terms of who they look to hire. Baltimore is certainly one that I could see making a lot of sense for Sean McDermott. And the other one would be Tennessee.
We know the Titans have pursued. John Harbaugh, they wanted to speak to Kevin Stefanski again before he took Atlanta. They want to speak to Jeff Hafley again, although I believe Hafley's in the building with Miami right now, and I'm not sure he leaves without getting that job. Matt Nagy and Robert Saul are in Tennessee today, but given the aggressiveness of Tennessee, they've got a quarterback, great place to live, new stadium opening. There are aspects of that job, Rich, that I would just say don't count them out as a potential option for Sean McDermott.
There's one more, Tom. Let me hit this with you. Because, again, the Ravens, he was not going to go there. Ravens weren't going to hire him either. Even though they have an MVP quarterback, and everyone would want to coach an MVP quarterback.
But now there's another MVP quarterback that's open. Is there any shot, Mike Tomlin? It's just like, okay, hey, Mike. Listen. Um Mm-hmm.
Let's kick a tire here and see what's up. You want to coach Josh Allen? And again, I understand the idea would be to potentially not go another CEO head coach. But it would be, let's get a play caller. The next voice to be heard in Josh Allen's ear is going to be potentially your head coach and a familiar voice at that.
In your ear. What about kicking a tire on Mike Tomlin saying, this is the one shot, maybe? we have to see if you're interested. And then we'll trade And we'll talk turkey with the runies. What do you think, Tom?
Well, there's several things. You mentioned some of them there. Question one is: Would the Rooney even trade Mike Tomlin to Buffalo? Yeah, just up the rate. If they are unwilling, that's exactly drivable.
I've done that drive during training camp. That is very close geographically, and it's one of your AFC rivals. They'd have to be willing to do it. Even if they were, do the Bills want to go into the. Defensive-minded 50-something-year-old coach Bucket for a guy who, you know, quite frankly, he hasn't had Josh Allen, but he has not had as much success over the last nine years as Sean McDermott has.
He did, you know, obviously, Mike won a Super Bowl. That was in his second season. He's been to another Super Bowl, but in recent years, he hasn't won a playoff game in nine years. The nine years that Sean McDermott won eight playoff games, he got fired for it is a nine-year stretch in which Mike Domlin has not won a single playoff game. The third part of it is whether Tomlin is willing to listen.
Yes, you would think if there were a place that can contend right away that has the quarterback, that's the type of job that would be interesting to Mike Tomlin. But I mentioned this on game day morning, I think yesterday, Rich, with you. You know, a member of Giants' ownership, shortly after Mike Tomlin stepped down as the head coach of the Steelers, reached out to Tomlin. And that person was not alone. But Giants' ownership reached out to Mike Tomlin and said, Hey, would you have any interest in doing this?
The answer was, I do not plan to coach in 2026. At this point, I don't believe that Mike Tomlin is in a mental space where he wants to coach in 2026. If that changes this week, next week, a month from now, there's all kinds of different things that could happen. But right now, albeit with a little bit of a pumping of the brakes in certain places to evaluate the Sean McDermott aspect of this, a lot of these coaching searches right now are full steam ahead. They're going to be moving relatively rapidly here over the next week or two.
All right. In the next couple of minutes, just to wrap things up, Tom, how did Stefanski land in Atlanta? And walk me through best you can the Packers' mindset in keeping LaFleur. I would say with Atlanta, Kevin Stefansky did an initial virtual interview there. Him and Matt Ryan are both from Philadelphia.
I was told basically the conversation never stopped. The interview never stopped. The two of them were talking a ton. You know, Stefansky at one point FaceTimed Matt Ryan, and Ryan is sitting there watching tape. He's been on the job for a couple of days, and he's in there.
This is much closer to John Elway than it is to Tom Brady. Matt Ryan is very invested.
So you've got that kind of kindred football spirit that Kevin Stefansky was looking for. Tennessee wanted to bring him on on Sunday. The Falcons got the interview set up on Saturday. It was more of a coronation than an actual interview. Not a surprise that Stefansky lives in Atlanta, where you can argue, well, his issue in Cleveland was he didn't have the quarterback.
You don't have the quarterback in Atlanta. No, but you got B. John Robinson and Drake London and maybe Kyle Pitts if you tag him or re-sign him. You got a ton of weapons and oh yeah, a quarterback that you could choose to potentially work out a new deal with in Kirk Cousins, who had Kevin Stefanski as his OC. Year that Stefansky ended up getting the job.
In terms of the Packers and Matt LaFleur, that never really changed. The mentality was always there. They wanted to see how the season played out. There was a comment that Ed Paulisey, the new president and CEO, made last offseason about, hey, I want to see the season. That set off bells and whistles with a lot of people: is this guy in trouble?
Is Matt LaFleur? Is he coaching for his job? I never got the sense that any of that was real. They never called John Harbaugh. They weren't considering replacing a 46-year-old head coach who also is a top play caller with a 63-year-old.
It just didn't make sense. And that's nothing against John Harbaugh. They weren't going to go down that road. This was a negotiation on the financials. They were able over several days to figure that out.
There were conversations about how does everybody be the best that they can be between Matt LaFleur and Brian Goodekunst, as well as Russ Ball, who's there as the executive vice president. Once they felt like they were in a good place, the market was pretty well established for. What Matt LaFleur is. He ends up staying in Green Bay. And so now, with Sean McDermott out, With Green Bay not making a move, we have eight head coaching vacancies across the NFL.
And if I may, Rich, really quick, kind of game this out, I would say the next one to watch is going to be Miami with Jeff Hafley there this afternoon. He is, as I reported over the weekend, a frontrunner for the position, has a relationship with John Eric Sullivan. I would be surprised if Jeff Hafley is not the coach of the Dolphins, but he does still have teams like the Titans that are tugging at him. The Steelers are interested in Jeff Hafley as well. There are other teams trying to see if they can potentially get him out of there.
Tennessee is the other one that could go anytime. Naggy and Sala are there today. Naggy, of course, has the relationship with Mike Borganzi from their days in Kansas City. The Raiders have seemingly ramped up their process. They're actually in Miami to watch Fernando Mendoza play in the national championship game tonight.
Well, they spent the morning with Mike McDaniel, who's a head coaching candidate to potentially work with Fernando Mendoza. They're then going to stay down there in Miami. Tom Brady lives in the air. Area and interview a couple more candidates over the next couple of days. That one could get moving.
In terms of the top jobs, though, Rich, the ones that I would say are the ones that everybody is talking about here, I don't get the sense the Ravens are in a rush. They are setting up second interviews this week. Anthony Weaver, their former player and assistant coach, is one of those who's getting that job. Obviously, Buffalo is just getting off the ground. And then you have Pittsburgh, which is setting up additional interviews this week.
They spoke with Adrio Averro, I believe, this morning. They've got Brian Flores coming in tomorrow. And then on Wednesday, one I'm really fascinated in, Mike McCarthy. Pittsburgh Native, Super Bowl winner, 12 out of 18 seasons. He's gone to the playoffs.
He's everything they haven't hired in the past. Offensive background, been a head coach before, and he's 62 years old. They have very consistently hired 30-something first-time defensive backgrounds. But if you're thinking about this from the Steelers' perspective, and there are not a ton of candidates that fall into that bucket right now in terms of what you've always hired. McCarthy has a relationship with the GM, Omar Khan.
McCarthy knows how to develop a quarterback, which, whether it's Will Howard or somebody they draft, they're going to have to do that eventually. And don't discount that if Aaron Rodgers is ever going to play football again, the one person on the planet besides Mike Tomlin he might consider doing that with is Mike McCarthy. Is that right? Because last we heard in an athletic article a couple years ago, a bleach report article, pardon me, that. That wasn't the case, but that would be fascinating.
You never know, man. Tom, I know you got to go. We appreciate the time. You've got Friday back here on the program. We'll keep unpacking this stuff, and obviously, that'll be two days before Jared Siddhen gets a start.
Thanks for the time, man. Thank you, Rich. Tom Pelcero, everybody. Rocky, Rich Eyes.
Okay. I got a few things that he just said. I just want to hit on. Let's take a break. We'll come back right here.
There's also some injury news outside of involves the championship weekend as well. The Seahawks just lost somebody. That's coming up. The Rich Eisen Show, the podcast. As you know, managing maintenance, repair, and operations is never easy.
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Terms and conditions apply. 844-204-Rich, number to Dell. Take a phone call in just a split second. Tom Pellisero said a few things I just want to throw out here.
So he said Sean McDermott, he could see him being a a candidate for the Ravens job. Age fifty-one? He knows what it takes. He knows how to coach up an MVP quarterback. You get an offensive coordinator that talks to Lamar, off you go.
That's it. The guy who Interestingly enough, is let go. In part Potentially, because the Ravens let go of their guys saying, We haven't gone far enough. Let's get the guy who didn't go far enough in Buffalo and put him here in. in Baltimore, saying it's a possible candidate.
He also didn't mention one name when he was talking through the possible Buffalo candidates about people who. Have uh Been in Buffalo and Josh Allen apparently really likes. Because if I'm them, I want my next coach to be really liked by Josh Allen. Yeah. That's at the top of the list.
Yeah. Who does Josh like that? Absolute must.
Now Josh Allen had in his ear. when things were just beginning to ascend, Brian Dable.
Now again. Why would you if you haven't gone far enough? You've hit a ceiling. Why do you think the guy that's going to break through that ceiling is the guy who. Had his ceiling hit In year one in New York, where he was coach of the year, and everything went south after that.
Yep. I don't know. Crazier things have happened. If this happens. And The Ravens fire John Harbaugh, who replaces Brian Dayball, who replaces Sean McDermott, who replaces John Harbaugh.
If that happens. Then the NFL has reached its latest peak of you can't make this stuff up. If the Ravens And the Giants. And the bills. Hop on the same coaching carousel and just rotate like it's a volleyball game.
Just boom. That would be insane. Yeah. The Ravens guy. Goes to the New York uh the New York metropolitan area.
So yeah, that's right. The New York metropolitan area or As I'm sure he would say. It's great to be coaching in the one spot That has an NFL team in New York. Brian Dable, you know, he'd be throwing out the red meat. I'm just a New Jersey guy coming back to New York.
If he goes. Up the thruway and hangs a left. And then the guy who goes from Buffalo goes down to Baltimore. I would say I'm dumb here, but I just like being here. And we have we're just getting started.
Insane. Yeah. Let's go to Terzo in Iowa. What's up, Terzo? You hanging in there, buddy?
Oh, what's up, guys? You know, I'm just really concerned about the CBA and the WNBA right now. You know, that's your way of saying your football season's done? Is that what you're saying? Yeah.
Unfortunately, that was That was a good old Ass whooping right there. I'm I'm I'm not shocked at what Seattle did to us. I'm pretty amazed that we got to this point. They're just so much better than us, and I got to take my hat off to them. Great game by them, great game plan.
It was over once the first kick went off.
So Heck of a year. Happy we made it this far. Hopefully, we can stay healthy next year. Thanks for the call, Terzo. Hang in there, buddy.
Hang in there. The Seahawks a perfect night, with the exception of... Zach Charbonnet getting hurt, and today we found out It's a knee injury that will knock him out for the rest of the playoffs. Another crucial Player In the playoffs. Needing surgery, a significant knee surgery as well.
Jeffrey followed up. That's an ACL. Oh, no. Yeah. So he's going to maybe miss most of the next season.
12 touchdowns. 12. He was awesome this year. They had such a great one. Maybe the best one-two running back and Kenneth Walker, the third, right?
Yeah. So that's a significant injury. I mean, the run game for the Seattle Seahawks is so crucial. Don't forget, though, the opponent that's coming into the building. It was Sam Darnold and his arm.
that carried the night against the rams. Down 30 to 14. Come back. Force overtime, win it in overtime, go for two in overtime, end of game. End of the Rams.
real best shot. At winning the one seed, and that's part and parcel of the reason why this game is in Seattle. Folks, is this man's arm right there. But that said, The support of this man's arm, certainly if his oblique isn't all that great, would be a run game that will now be without their leading touchdown maker.
So that'll be just another aspect of the championship weekend. The Rich Eisen Show Podcast. Mm-hmm.
