Teams Arizona Cardinals - The Buzzsaw

[Wizard]

Lets even it out and list the cons against the Cards and why a coach would decline an interview:

s**t GM - Check
Chance to be fired after your first year in the job - Check
******ed owner who allows the GM to keep his job while firing the coach the GM appointed last offseason - Check

s**t GM - You may be right, but he is clearly no the absolute worst. And if the Mike McCarthy rumors are true this is irrelevant as he would have been gone.
Chance to be fired after your first year in the job - It has happened once in franchise history and clearly it need to happen. There were no signs of life, no signs of improvement.
******ed owner who allows the GM to keep his job while firing the coach the GM appointed last offseason - Bidwell made it clear that he made this appointment, not Kiem.

Do we need to do a pros and cons list for NYJ, Bengals, Bucs, Dolphins?

 

[CasuallyDressed]

s**t GM - You may be right, but he is clearly no the absolute worst. And if the Mike McCarthy rumors are true this is irrelevant as he would have been gone.
Chance to be fired after your first year in the job - It has happened once in franchise history and clearly it need to happen. There were no signs of life, no signs of improvement.
******ed owner who allows the GM to keep his job while firing the coach the GM appointed last offseason - Bidwell made it clear that he made this appointment, not Kiem.

Do we need to do a pros and cons list for NYJ, Bengals, Bucs, Dolphins?

If they bring Gase in, they shouldn't let him leave.

Like him for this job, much more than McCarthy.

 

[A11dAtP0w3R]

Do we need to do a pros and cons list for NYJ, Bengals, Bucs, Dolphins?

Well at least we know Mike Brown will give his HC a decent amount of time to perform

Even if the Wilks firing after one season was a once off, any aspiring HC with numerous suitors could easily see it as a red flag and balk, especially those that haven't been a HC in the NFL before, id love to know how many one and done coaches got a second chance. Wouldn't think it was many...if any. Job security and being given a decent amount of time to get the team playing how a HC wants for the untried like Bieniemy would be one of, if not his biggest want in a franchise I would think.

 

[Wizard]

Well at least we know Mike Brown will give his HC a decent amount of time to perform

Even if the Wilks firing after one season was a once off, any aspiring HC with numerous suitors could easily see it as a red flag and balk, especially those that haven't been a HC in the NFL before, id love to know how many one and done coaches got a second chance. Wouldn't think it was many...if any. Job security and being given a decent amount of time to get the team playing how a HC wants for the untried like Bieniemy would be one of, if not his biggest want in a franchise I would think.

Hue Jackson
Mike Mularkey
Marty Schottenheimer

That’s the list of one & done guys to get second chances.

 

[A11dAtP0w3R]

Hue Jackson
Mike Mularkey
Marty Schottenheimer

That’s the list of one & done guys to get second chances.

huh, can't believe I forgot about Hue only lasting one year in Oakland.

Mularkey coached the Bills for two years in his first stint as HC so wasn't one and done.

Schottenhiemer before my time following the NFL but turned into a great HC.

Cheers for naming two of them though.

 

[A11dAtP0w3R]

says on Wiki (not that wiki can always be completely trusted) that Schottenheimer first HC position was with the Browns and he last 4 years 1984-88

so maybe thanks for one name being correct out of the three

Maybe I should double check on Hue, lol

edit: ahh I think we have just misunderstood each other, I meant coaches that were sacked after one year in their FIRST HC position.... Hue fits the bill, Murlarkey and Schott were one and done by teams later on in their coaching careers ... all good.

 

[Wizard]

says on Wiki (not that wiki can always be completely trusted) that Schottenheimer first HC position was with the Browns and he last 4 years 1984-88

so maybe thanks for one name being correct out of the three

Maybe I should double check on Hue, lol

edit: ahh I think we have just misunderstood each other, I meant coaches that were sacked after one year in their FIRST HC position.... Hue fits the bill, Murlarkey and Schott were one and done by teams later on in their coaching careers ... all good.

2001 at Washington before he went to San Diego.

 

[Wizard]

huh, can't believe I forgot about Hue only lasting one year in Oakland.

Mularkey coached the Bills for two years in his first stint as HC so wasn't one and done.

Schottenhiemer before my time following the NFL but turned into a great HC.

Cheers for naming two of them though.

Mularkey went 2-14 in his one year at Jacksonville.

 

[Broken]

2001 at Washington before he went to San Diego.

Should never have fired Marty after that 8-8 season.

What do you think of the Wilks firing? To me it sound like he got the boot before he got the chance to do anything of note.

 

[Exe Gesis]

Great article here on the new HC Kliff Kingsbury.....

https://www.sbnation.com/2018/11/28...y-coach-offensive-coordinator-hire-rumors-nfl

 

[Exe Gesis]

The Cardinals are hiring Kliff Kingsbury a month after USC made him offensive coordinator

Kliff Kingsbury somehow tumbled into an NFL head coaching job immediately after getting fired at Texas Tech.

Troy Taormina-USA TODAY Sports

After six years as the head coach at Texas Tech, Kliff Kingsbury was fired at the end of a 5-7 season. But his brief unemployment only set up Kingsbury for a better job.

According to FOX Sports’ Peter Schrager, Kingsbury is finalizing a deal with the Arizona Cardinals to be their new head coach. That’s quite the tumble up the coaching ladder for a coach who was fired in November, and accepted another prestigious job in December.



In early December, Kingsbury was announced as the new offensive coordinator of the USC Trojans:

It was a big coup for USC, because there was no shortage of teams vying for Kingsbury’s services. But even after joining the Trojans, Kingsbury received NFL interest. Those opportunities were shut down by USC, but that may have cost them their coordinator before he ever coached in a game.



This was a storm that’s been brewing since just about the day Kingsbury joined USC. Back in December, Jay Glazer said there were NFL teams taking a close look at his contract to see if they could lure him before he really gets started in Los Angeles.



The 39-year-old is a former Texas Tech quarterback under Mike Leach who had a brief NFL career before rising through the coaching ranks as an offensive coordinator at Houston and Texas A&M. At the latter, he helped Johnny Manziel win the Heisman Trophy.

At Texas Tech, Kingsbury again coached up a high-octane offense — led for a while by Patrick Mahomes — but the defense could never keep up.

Once he was no longer a head coach, just about every football team was licking their chops at the idea of Kingsbury running its offense.

The Cardinals weren’t the only NFL team interested

Three days after he was fired by Texas Tech, Kingsbury already reportedly had two “firm offers” to join an NFL coaching staff:



The list of teams that were connected to Kingsbury included the Rams, Patriots, Jets, and Cardinals. The first two on that list have coaches in no danger of losing their job any time soon.

Before he joined USC, the Rams’ Sean McVay was ready to bring Kingsbury on for the end of the season and the playoffs:



For the Patriots, it’d likely be as a replacement for Josh McDaniels — the team’s offensive coordinator who is considered a top head coaching candidate this offseason.

But the interest shown by the Cardinals and Jets was more significant. Each team has a head coaching vacancy after firing Steve Wilks and Todd Bowles, respectively.

https://twitter.com/AdamSchefter/status/1082371694872936448
https://twitter.com/AdamSchefter/status/1082373110433808385


Why was Kingsbury in such high demand?

Points. Sweet, delicious points.

The Texas Tech offense averaged 37.8 points in his 75 games as head coach. He helped Manziel turn Texas A&M into an offensive juggernaut, and then did the same at Texas Tech with Mahomes, Davis Webb, and Nic Shimonek.

No era was more prolific than Mahomes’ two years at the helm. Texas Tech averaged 45.1 points per game in 2015 and 43.7 points in 2016.

In 2018, true freshman Alan Bowman took over at quarterback for Texas Tech early in the season after junior McLane Carter suffered an ankle injury. Then Bowman suffered a collapsed lung and was replaced by sophomore Jeff Duffey. Despite those injuries, Texas Tech is still 26th in the offensive S&P+ ratings.

The problem in Lubbock is — and always has been — defense.

Texas Tech is 91st in the defensive S&P+ ratings this season and never finished higher than 83rd during Kingsbury’s tenure. The team consistently scored more than 30 points in losses.

Most famously, there was the time Mahomes had 819 combined passing and rushing yards, but Texas Tech still lost to a Baker Mayfield-led Oklahoma team, 66-59, in October 2016.

The consistent defensive letdowns kept Texas Tech stuck in neutral and eventually led to Kingsbury’s firing. But what if he was in charge of nothing but offense?

Like Lane Kiffin’s three-year stint at Alabama (oh god, what if Alabama hired Kingsbury?), similarly making Kingsbury an offensive coordinator while someone else is in charge of keeping teams off the scoreboard just makes too much sense.

Kingsbury has developed several NFL quarterbacks

Before landing the head coaching job at Texas Tech, Kingsbury was a finalist for the Broyles Award in 2012, recognizing the top assistant coach in the nation. That honor came because Kingsbury helped redshirt freshman Johnny Manziel to the Heisman Trophy in a Texas A&M offense that averaged 44.5 points per game.

Before he joined Texas A&M, Kingsbury spent four seasons as an assistant at Houston. There, he helped develop Case Keenum and was co-offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach when Houston averaged 49.3 points in 2011.

Both Mahomes and Manziel ended up being first-round picks in the NFL, and Keenum has been a starter for the Rams, Vikings, and Broncos, despite going undrafted.

That’s an impressive list of protégés for someone who’s only a decade into his coaching career.

It’s not perfect, though. When he arrived at Texas Tech in 2013, he had a pair of freshman quarterbacks: Davis Webb and Baker Mayfield. Both transferred, and Mayfield went on to become a Heisman Trophy winner at Oklahoma and No. 1 pick in the NFL Draft.

“When I got hurt, there was no communication between me and my coach,” Mayfield told ESPN. “When I got healthy, I didn’t know why I wasn’t playing right away. At that time, we were losing a couple games in a row. I was still clueless as to why I wasn’t playing. That was really frustrating for me because I started the first five games and we won. So, I just didn’t really know exactly what he was thinking or what the situation was.”

Webb’s transfer happened after Mahomes supplanted him as the starter. Webb was eventually drafted in the third round of the 2017 NFL Draft by the Giants, but waived a year later. He’s now a member of the Jets.

At USC, Kingsbury was to be tasked with the development of J.T. Daniels, a 6’3, 200-pound quarterback who started as a true freshman for the Trojans in 2018. He finished the year with 14 touchdowns and 10 interceptions.

Now Kingsbury will groom a UCLA product instead in the Cardinals’ 2018 first-round pick Josh Rosen. In his rookie season, Rosen threw 11 touchdowns with 14 interceptions.

It’s time to embrace the air raid

Mahomes put up huge numbers in Kingsbury’s offense, but there was reason to be pessimistic about his ability to continue to produce in the NFL.
At the time, there wasn’t a successful single NFL quarterback who was a product of a college air raid offense. Jared Goff had just finished a horrible rookie season and the closest thing to a success story was Nick Foles.

Since then, Goff has ascended into one of the NFL’s elite passers, Foles won the Super Bowl MVP award, and Mahomes is currently making a case as the 2018 NFL MVP. It’s air raid season.

Shotgun is an increasingly large part of an NFL team’s playbook, and spread concepts are leaking up from the college ranks to the professional ones.
One of the criticisms of the air raid offense is that it has historically been, in the words of SB Nation’s Jason Kirk, “an underdog offense, for teams that can’t just overpower or out-speed opponents.” But Kingsbury’s Texas Tech always had a bit more than that.

“Our offense is a lot more complex than the old air raid, because Coach Kingsbury, coming from the NFL, has made it more complex,” Mahomes told Bleacher Report in 2017. “And that’s why it’s so successful.”

Washington State head coach Mike Leach explained that his air raid offense aims to “throw it short to people who can score.” But Mahomes attempted 91 deep passes in his final season at Texas Tech, fifth-most in the nation. That makes Kingsbury’s offense dangerous at any level of football.

Offense is at an all-time high in the NFL and teams that aren’t thinking progressively are running the risk of getting left behind. The Cardinals are rolling the dice in a big way, but it could pay huge dividends for Rosen and the struggling Arizona offense.

 

[Exe Gesis]

Patrick Mahomes says Kliff Kingsbury could be “great” NFL head coach

Posted by Charean Williams on January 8, 2019, 4:19 PM EST

Getty Images


Patrick Mahomes got Kliff Kingsbury his job with the Cardinals, even though Kingsbury went only 16-21 with Mahomes in three seasons as his quarterback at Texas Tech.

(Baker Mayfield started eight games at Texas Tech as a freshman in 2013 when the Red Raiders went 8-5.)

In November, after Gil Brandt first predicted Kingsbury could end up as a head coach in the NFL this season, Mahomes predicted success for Kingsbury in the NFL.

Now that Kingsbury is close officially to becoming an NFL head coach, Mahomes again endorsed his former head coach.

“I think he could be a great NFL head coach,” Mahomes said, via James Palmer of NFL Media. “He has the work ethic. He has the passion for the game. I know he loves the sport, and I know he’s going to be able to relate to quarterbacks. He would put in the work, and now it’s about him finding out where he needs to be.”

Mahomes led the nation with 421 passing yards per game in his final season with the Red Raiders, throwing 41 touchdowns and 10 interceptions. Texas Tech, though, was only 5-7, including 3-6 in the Big 12.

The Cardinals, though, apparently were enamored enough with Mahomes’ NFL success to roll the dice on Kingsbury, who inherits Josh Rosen after working with Case Keenum, Johnny Manziel, Mayfield and Mahomes in the college ranks.

 

[Wizard]

I "think" i am happy about this hire. In all honesty i wanted Adam Gase but i'm not upset by this.

What it obviously means is that we have to go all in (with the checkbook) to get a high level DC - Bowles or Pagano preferably.

 

[Exe Gesis]

I "think" i am happy about this hire. In all honesty i wanted Adam Gase but i'm not upset by this.

What it obviously means is that we have to go all in (with the checkbook) to get a high level DC - Bowles or Pagano preferably.

Bowles is likely DC at Tampa under Arians

 

[A11dAtP0w3R]

Better draft an OLine quick smart if they want to play the air raid game or Rosen's concussion issues will be back quick smart, over to you GM genius, Steve Keim

 

[Wizard]

Bowles is likely DC at Tampa under Arians

It does seem that way which is disappointing, however that seems to be unverified and people just connecting dots.

Possible that given our situation he might get offered a Wade Phillips LA type role with us where he is effectively HC of the defense which may have a greater appeal. Who knows.

 

[Exe Gesis]

It does seem that way which is disappointing, however that seems to be unverified and people just connecting dots.

Possible that given our situation he might get offered a Wade Phillips LA type role with us where he is effectively HC of the defense which may have a greater appeal. Who knows.

With Kingsbury being so offensively-focused, you do need a strong DC who controls the whole thing and isnt micro-managed.
Would also seem Kingsbury coming could also mean he'd be happy taking charge of the offense like this as HC, and being happy to take on the entire current defensive staff. So Al Holcomb could be staying.

 

[Wizard]

With Kingsbury being so offensively-focused, you do need a strong DC who controls the whole thing and isnt micro-managed.
Would also seem Kingsbury coming could also mean he'd be happy taking charge of the offense like this as HC, and being happy to take on the entire current defensive staff. So Al Holcomb could be staying.

Al Holcomb was given his marching orders a couple of days after Wilks thankfully.

 

[Exe Gesis]

Al Holcomb was given his marching orders a couple of days after Wilks thankfully.

Oh well that's gonna be interesting then. Cards could land a stud DC as most teams are hiring offensive coordinators to HC jobs.

 

[Exe Gesis]

Kliff Kingsbury on Josh Rosen: “Hard to find a guy who throws it better”

Posted by Josh Alper on January 9, 2019, 3:17 PM EST

Getty Images


The Cardinals introduced Kliff Kingsbury as their new head coach at a press conference on Wednesday afternoon and there was little doubt about what landed him the job.
Cardinals president Michael Bidwill talked about the “output of his offenses” while he was a head coach at Texas Tech and offensive assistant at other schools and noted how many things from the college game have filtered into the NFL.
“I do think there’s a lot of things we did at Texas Tech that can be successful,” Kingsbury said.
General Manager Steve Keim added that developing 2018 first-round pick Josh Rosen was an “important piece of the puzzle” when they looked for Steve Wilks’ replacement. Kingsbury said he hasn’t done extensive work on studying Rosen, but that it is “hard to find a guy that throws it better” than the Cardinals quarterback.
Kingsbury also said that he will be calling the offensive plays because it’s an important part of his relationship with Rosen and it seemed clear on Wednesday that their relationship will be a defining one for Kingsbury’s tenure in Arizona.

 

[Exe Gesis]

Kliff Kingsbury could have a hard time putting a staff together

Posted by Mike Florio on January 9, 2019, 2:58 PM EST

Getty Images


Cardinals coach Kliff Kingsbury’s reported interest in hiring as his offensive coordinator the new head coach at Texas State University underscores one of the major challenges Kingsbury will be facing right out of the gates.
With no NFL coaching experience of any kind and, thus, a limited set of NFL contacts, how will Kingsbury put together an NFL coaching staff?
He’ll do it, apparently, by tapping into the network he has developed at the college level, with Jake Spavital the first in a list of names that would strike NFL coaches as something right out of the witness protection program.
The Cardinals, who were intent on hiring Kingsbury from the get-go (even though that was news to everyone including Kingsbury until recently), surely were aware of this complication. Perhaps Kingsbury will simply decide to keep some of Steve Wilks’ assistant coaches. Perhaps Kingsbury won’t have much of a choice.
Regardless, the success of any head coach hinges largely on the quality of his staff. And that could end up being an impediment for Kingsbury, since he’s at a clear disadvantage when it comes to tapping into a network that he simply doesn’t have.

 

[Wizard]

Kliff Kingsbury could have a hard time putting a staff together

Posted by Mike Florio on January 9, 2019, 2:58 PM EST

Getty Images


Cardinals coach Kliff Kingsbury’s reported interest in hiring as his offensive coordinator the new head coach at Texas State University underscores one of the major challenges Kingsbury will be facing right out of the gates.
With no NFL coaching experience of any kind and, thus, a limited set of NFL contacts, how will Kingsbury put together an NFL coaching staff?
He’ll do it, apparently, by tapping into the network he has developed at the college level, with Jake Spavital the first in a list of names that would strike NFL coaches as something right out of the witness protection program.
The Cardinals, who were intent on hiring Kingsbury from the get-go (even though that was news to everyone including Kingsbury until recently), surely were aware of this complication. Perhaps Kingsbury will simply decide to keep some of Steve Wilks’ assistant coaches. Perhaps Kingsbury won’t have much of a choice.
Regardless, the success of any head coach hinges largely on the quality of his staff. And that could end up being an impediment for Kingsbury, since he’s at a clear disadvantage when it comes to tapping into a network that he simply doesn’t have.

Typical absolutely nonsense Florio article.

Who is to say that Spavital isn't his first choice for OC? Honestly the stupidity in the NFL media sometimes is really frustrating.

I can't imagine Kiem is going to have any issues finding an experienced DC given how much responsibility they are going to carry.

 

[Exe Gesis]

Gregg Williams would be a great hire

 

[Exe Gesis]

i have a high regard for Kingsbury as offensive production goes.
gregg williams is a beastly DC
if they could get gregg, the cardinals could be quite the mover in 2019 power rankings.

 

[Wizard]

i have a high regard for Kingsbury as offensive production goes.
gregg williams is a beastly DC
if they could get gregg, the cardinals could be quite the mover in 2019 power rankings.

From a purely X & O point of view i agree.

However, i just don't think having that personality in the locker room is a great option for us.
Until now Kiem and Bidwell have been relatively conservative so i just don't see a splash hire like that coming.