Jay Gruden is usually on Mondays with G&D, and was supposed to be on Tuesday, as he was with Chris Russell on The Team 980, but the old ‘things happen’ pushed him to Wednesday – and after a little playful banter about Gruden’s Twitter antics Monday night via the Eagles’ struggles, we got down to the business at hand.
And that business is Adam Peters, who, as his first order of business, has to hire a head coach – and Gruden is surprised he’s not even interviewing a veteran name like a Harbaugh or Belichick.
“I don't think it hurts to interview a guy, and it's always good experience to interview somebody like that, to pick their brain and see what they did,” Gruden said. “Even if you don't hire him, you wanna interview as many people as you can and pick their brain – why wouldn't you interview a Hall of Fame coach like Bill Belichick or, or a guy who's worked for him like Mike Vrabel? Maybe they have a way of doing a practice schedule, or personnel meetings, or whatever, and you can learn something. That’s always good to do.”
Surprising but ‘not a horrible thing’ if they want to marry a young coach with a young QB, and right now, Gruden doesn’t know Peters, but hopes he sees maybe a little Duke Tobin, who was in Cincinnati’s front office when he coached there, as that was a really successful draft era for the Bengals, with collaborative effort.
“Working in concert is critical; you got to understand you're not going to get your way all the time, and the guy who's making the final pick sometimes should bite the bullet and listen to his coaches,” Gruden said. “Sometimes he shouldn't listen to his coaches and go with his gut, because nobody's perfect at picking out players, but as long as you take in the information and how they fit what we’re looking for, and you think he’s a good fit, everybody can agree that we'll take him and work with him.”
So if he were Peters, which head coaching candidate would Gruden shoot for: Johnson or Slowik?
“They're both very effective and have very good teams, but I think Ben Johnson is probably a little bit better just because of who Detroit was, and what they built there,” Gruden said. “Detroit has never been very good, and they kind of came from nowhere; they took a chance on Jared Goff and hit on some draft picks, and really built their offensive line the right way too, through the draft. They’re tough, and they match the coach’s identity.”
What about a dark horse candidate if an offensive coach is the desire?
“I think Baltimore, what Todd Monken has done over there has been pretty impressive. I think he's turned Baltimore into a team that is the most balanced team that I've seen in a long, long time,” Grudn said. “Tey can bust your mouth between the tackles and they can air it out, and what he's done with Lamar, he’s throwing the ball really well and accurately. Before, when you played Baltimore, if you got ahead of them, you felt pretty good about it because Lamar couldn't throw it to come back. Now, that’s not the case, Lamar is winging it all over the place. So I think that coach has done a great job, and I’d look at him as an interview.”
