Who's The Next Man In Seattle?

As championship weekend approaches in the NFL, the four remaining teams get ready to punch their ticket to the Super Bowl while the rest of the league begins their offseason planning. Eight teams decided to make a change at head coach, and half of those teams have made recent hires. The Patriots had a homegrown talent in Jerod Mayo who was apparently always the plan to replace Belichick. Mark Davis might have gotten pressured by his players into hiring interim coach Antonio Pierce. Tennessee went with the Brian Callahan, the Bengals OC for the past 5 seasons. The splashiest hire happened today when the Chargers welcomed Jim Harbaugh back to the NFL.. That leaves 4 franchises still searching for their guy - Seattle, Atlanta, Carolina, and Washington. With the most vibrant market for head coaching candidates maybe ever, the clubs with vacancies are understandably taking their time. It seems that Atlanta owner Arthur Blank has his eyes on Belichick, and assuming that’s the best job Bill is offered, that’s probably where he’ll go. In my ranking of the available head coaching candidates, all of those names were near the top of my list. Today I’m not here to predict what Washington or Carolina might do, I just want to focus on my hometown Seattle Seahawks.

Longtime Seahawks general manager John Schneider is now in charge of football operations, so he’ll be responsible for hand-picking his coaching staff. It’s safe to assume that Schneider and the Seahawks are taking their time to look at every suitable candidate, and since a few of those men are still coaching in the playoffs and therefore unable to conduct in-person interviews or accept new coaching jobs, Seattle can afford to be relatively patient.

I look at this decision the team is faced with as I’m sure many other Seahawk fans do - perhaps the most pivotal moment in our franchise’s history post-Super Bowl XLVIII. Letting go of Pete Carroll while he clearly still wanted to coach was a bold move by ownership, and how that move is perceived by fans will surely be influenced by the success of Pete’s replacement. If the hire is a home run, the decision will be looked at fondly as a forward-thinking and necessary change. But if the next man up falters, and the team doesn’t live up to the lofty expectations of Seahawk fans who have enjoyed being a playoff contender for 14 years, it could leave many wondering why we parted with our legendary coach in the first place. With all that being said, here is who I think would be a good fit in Seattle.

Ben Johnson - Offensive Coordinator, Detroit Lions

For almost a decade, we’ve seen the trend of NFL teams going after young, innovative, offensive play callers gain more and more momentum each year. One of the most recent examples of this trend is Indianapolis Colts head coach, Shane Steichen, who had a very strong first season coaching in Indy. The success of Steichen and others like him has teams on the lookout for the next young, bright, offensive innovator, and the #1 guy on their radars is Lions offensive coordinator, Ben Johnson. What Johnson has done to transform Detroit’s offense into a firework show is tremendous. He completely turned Jared Goff’s career around after the general consensus was that he was washed. Johnson is understandably a hot name on the market right now, so I imagine he’s at the top of the Seahawks list. The prospect of what Johnson could do to help elevate the play of Geno Smith, and then eventually develop the future franchise QB, must be extremely attractive to John Schneider.

Mike Macdonald - Defensive Coordinator, Baltimore Ravens

I view Mike Macdonald in a similar light as Ben Johnson, only he’s on the other side of the ball. What Macdonald has done with that defensive unit in Baltimore this season is phenomenal. As far as coaches who are elite at developing schemes, I put Macdonald right up there with Johnson. He is someone that I see making an instant impact wherever he decides to coach.

These are the two names that intrigue me the most, so I’m optimistic that the Seahawks and John Schneider are giving both of them serious consideration for the job.