Mr. Scot

Depending on which staffs are fired (besides the two already done) there are certainly some good assistants set to come available. I just don't see us actually getting any of them.

Previous years, I'd agree This season?

This idea has been floated around a couple of times, but is it truly practical? Well... Let's say you demand that Rhule fire some of his staff. If the choice of who stays and who goes remains his, then chances are he just fires the people with no prior connections to him, i.e. Pat Meyer, Brian Angelichio, Chase Blackburn, Don Johnson. Except for Johnson (who's basically an assistant to an assistant), Rhule has replacements readily available to him on staff for all of those guys. He's also got a former member of his staff available in DJ Mangas. Mangas left for a spot on the LSU staff (WR coach, I think) but isn't being retained by new head coach Brian Kelly. Jeff Nixon probably gets named OC in this scenario (or any other, to be honest) so you either leave him with double duty or backfill. Mangas might be an option for RB coach is Rhule wants Nixon to concentrate solely on the OC job. And ultimate the staff becomes more Rhulified than ever. Does that leave us better off? Deck chairs...Titanic...etc. So then you say "Okay, force him to hire outside his own circle." You mean like he did with Joe Brady? Think about that for a moment. Can you imagine the interview process? The whole notion sounds awkward as hell. So then have Fitterer, Morgan or someone else do the interviews, basically hiring guys to work under a coach that doesn't want them? Yikes On top of all that, remember that Rhule turned down the Jets over staff control. Could forcing staff changes make him take off again? Maybe (and that's not the worst that could happen). But by the time all this comes to a head, have the other candidates all been hired? Quite possibly. Oy Bottom Line: The notion of forcing Rhule to make staff changes might sound good in theory, but in reality it likely isn't gonna work. So if (as many of us fear) Rhule does get another year, it's something of an "all in" proportion. And that...is terrifying

Zylstra

Those aren't championships. I give him all the credit in the world at the mid-tier college level, but before I hand over full control of an NFL team to anybody, I'm gonna need to see a national championship at the very least. As it was, if Tepper had simply handed him a standard head coaching job, I'd likely be a lot more charitable right now. Unfortunately, that's not what happened.

Can he coach?

Probably also thinks they were well coached

I think the phrase "see what you've done" probably works better here

Jeff McLane wrote a pretty detailed story about how bad Jeffrey Lurie and Howie Roseman were handling things.

At this point, there's already an awful lot of discussion about Rhule possibly being the worst coach we've ever had. Thinking about another year of that?

Did Capers truly "not work out" or was it just that things went wrong when they gave him roster control? (that's turned out to be a bad idea for us more than once now)

Honestly, I'd prefer a "Cone of Competence" right now. A "Square of Smartness" would be nice too.

Our three quarterback system is going to take the league by storm

Jags did a better job of maintaining that early success than we did too.

Yes, rebuilding, but into what? It's fair to say the teams where Rhule coached did get better, but did any of them really become champions or perennial contenders or anything like that during his time? In the end, his actual profile is that of a guy who can somewhat improve your team and then move on.

Hope so, but with the new end of season interview window, by the time that happens other teams could already be talking to the best head coaching candidates about contract terms. I've become a huge fan of Nathaniel Hackett, though I don't know that he's got much connection to anybody currently with the Panthers other than a couple of position coaches (Jason Simmons, for one). Brian Daboll certainly has high connections (Dan Morgan, Pat Stewart) but the hype surrounding him is starting to dim. And he wasn't my favorite candidate in the first place, obviously. If we have to do this again next year, there will certainly be candidates (Rams OC Kevin O'Connell is getting a lot of hype) but I feel like if we miss out on a guy like Hackett, we're going to come to regret it.

They followed a similar philosophy in Seattle.

The story about former Panthers / current Bills players talking to their former teammates about "sending Rhule back to college" is definitely believable. Possibly the biggest thing that tells you is that when they were making these statements, they knew they had a receptive audience.

Regarding the Eagles, some folks are saying that Nick Sirianni has turned a corner with his coaching. One writer said that he's learned how to identify what his players do well and build around it. Wish we could say something like that

If you're not following The 33rd Team, you should. They put out a lot of good content. Doug Pederson on How to Build a Super Bowl Winning Quarterback Room To be clear, this isn't meant to stump for Pederson in any way. It's just a really interesting and informative article.

My biggest fear right now is that we're going to miss out on far better coaching options (even great coaching options) by sticking with Rhule for another year. If the stories about players from other teams mocking our situation are true, that potentially means there'll be challenges in free agency as well. And yeah, it's depressing. The team is barely watchable as it is.

I don't have an opinion on Huntley yet, but I'm big on being careful.

That'd be a damn good start, though.

Also, this...

Apparently not