Skip to main content

Broncos get a coach!

The Denver Broncos have hired Josh McDaniels, an assistant member of the New England Patriots' disgraced coaching staff, as their new head coach. For more details on the man, see McDaniels' Wikipedia page. If I'm reading it right, McDaniels had a different job during each of New England's Super Bowl-winning seasons, serving as a personnel assistant, defensive coaching assistant, and quarterbacks coach. That's not quite the same as being a "head coach" or "offensive coordinator" during that time, you know, though he did serve in the second capacity during New England's most recent Super Bowl appearance, a loss in which the team's vaunted, record-breaking offense scored just 14 points.

Of course, one reason the Broncos went with such a young coach—McDaniels is 32, which means we probably had some of the same toys as kids—is that they still have eight figures in obligations to their living legend, the recently-terminated Mike Shanahan.

Yeah, next season's going to be great.

To be fair, he got fifty touchdown passes out of Tom Brady last season, not that I have any interest in being fair.

Comments

blaine said…
I was surprised when I heard they hired McDaniels. I still think they should have looked at someone with a little more experience. To my knowledge Jim Fassel is still available. However, the Broncos clearly weren't interested in interviewing candidates with previous head coaching experience.

I think in order for McDaniels to have a chance at having any success with the Broncos that Pat Bowlen will need to hire a good GM and a good Defensive Coordinator. At least we know that McDaniels will be skilled at the art of inconspicuous video taping of his opponents.
8:37 AM
Mike said…
Jim Fassel? Marty Schottenheimer? Blaine, where do you come up with these guys?
9:06 AM
John said…
I was worried we were going to hir this guy, and not only becuase we owe Shanny the GDP of Denmark over the next few years. McDaniels strikes me as the safe but uninspiring pick: there has been so much hype around the Patriots and their offense that some has invariably rubbed off of him, so guys like Sean Salisbury can claim they knew about him all along. But, unsurprisingly, I disagree with the conventional wisdom here: based on what I have seen, Patriots assistants have not been working out all that well as head coaches (see Crennel, Weis, and Mangini), and I have no real reason to think McDaniels will be much different.

Besides, isn't our problem player personnel decisions? And how does this help us there?

Jim Fassel and Marty Schottenheimer? I couldn't think of two more undeserving retreads. What are you thinking, Blaine? Particularly in the case of Schottenheimer - he has made his career out of losing to the Broncos, not beating them.
10:15 AM
blaine said…
Why is everyone opposed to a proven winner? Schottenheimer has had a winning record with every team where he has been the head coach. For his career he's won over 60% of the games he's coached and his overall record is 200-126 (in the regular season).

The point is moot considering the Broncos have already made their decision, and I'm not saying that Marty was the right man for the job. I just think his record at least warrants an interview with the Broncos.
11:49 AM
Mike said…
Golly, Blaine, you're right. Wait, what did you say his playoff record was? 5-13? You realize the man was on the wrong side of The Drive, right?

John, I agree about the hype, and that was more or less my point of pointing out his job titles: he wasn't the critical in the glory days, and when he was o-coord, the team collapsed in the Super Bowl.
11:56 AM
David said…
agree with the retread comments. us denver sports folk love this tactic (see rockies, nuggets). something about the thin air must translate to frugality.

but seriously, mcdaniels must be one hell of an interviewer. i'm disappointed with the pick.

what happened to defense? freak, this move does nothing.
12:14 PM
John said…
if Marty Schottenheimer was such a proven winner, why hasn't anyone else hired him in the two years he has been out of the game? The 60% winning percentage in the regular season v. 5-13 in the playoffs tells you all you need to know - the guy gets on good teams and then chokes on "Marty Ball" in the playoffs.

Mike: That was exactly my point about the hype. It is more important that Chris Berman talks about you on air than it is that you haven't gotten it done.

DP: I had the same thought about the defense. Do we not even care about that side of the ball anymore?
4:14 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Top Dozen Pro Quarterbacks

With the NFL season over, it’s time for year two of my annual quarterback rankings . Actually, last year the list was of quarterbacks I’d take over Jake Plummer. Since such a list this year would be at least a novella, I’ve changed it to the top twelve quarterbacks. This list is intended to be the best quarterbacks as of today and/or next season. Thus, it won’t correspond perfectly with, say, my list of the best young quarterbacks . Vince Young’s completion percentage, for example, will count against him more here. That said, some predictions are still involved. (For example, will Jake Delhomme and Ben Roethlisberger bounce back?) The winners: 12. Philip Rivers, San Diego. Rivers may deserve a higher spot on this list. I’m just trying not to get too carried away. On the plus side, he’s on a fine team (if they have coaches next year) and has a fantastic arm. On the downside, he’s young and was nothing special in the playoffs. So there’s a chance he won’t be quite so good next year, tho...
9 comments
Read more

The Mitchell Report

It came out today, and you may have already looked at it. If not, you can download it as a pdf all over the place, including from ESPN.com . Anyway, the big name named in it was Roger Clemens. That's what we've been waiting all this time for? I don't even know what to say, because this is like the least-surprising report of all time. I hate the gotcha crap that goes on when stuff like this happens. You know, the know-it-alls who say how obvious it was that Clemens had been cheating for years—hey, just look at his age! (Did these people say this so confidently  before Clemens was named? No. And have they ever heard of Nolan Ryan?) But seriously. He's huge, he put really big numbers for a really long time, and he's considered this super-intense jerk—basically, he's Barry Bonds on the mound. Setting aside the moral issues of steroid use (and believe me, I'm against it), I was hoping for some entertainment out of today's revelations, and I was sorely dis...
5 comments
Read more

Who cares?

So we finally got done with the NBA playoffs after nearly two months of stretched-out play, and tomorrow's the draft. I really couldn't care less. I'm so burned out on the sport. Sadly, there's nothing else going on worth mentioning, so we might as well get into it. (Yes, baseball, Pugs, but I haven't really started following that this year yet, sorry.) Would the NFL hold its draft five days after the Super Bowl? Of course not, and not just because the league doesn't want to distract from the highlight of its annual calendar, the Pro Bowl. Of course, the NBA's situation is a little different. College play ended two and a half months ago, and the teams want to get draftees ready for the all-important summer league play (because the kind of guys that need the summer league always end up players). Not that when college basketball is over is relevant, anyway-the league is overrun by a bunch of high school players "just months removed from their prom" (...
12 comments
Read more