- The Cleveland Browns want to interview former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice for their head-coaching job, according to Adam Schefter of ESPN.
- Rice is a lifelong Browns fan, and there is a lot of admiration for Rice inside the Browns organization.
- It is unclear if Rice would be interested in interviewing for the position or if the Browns would even hire her, but they want to see what she could bring to the organization.
- That Rice is being considered for the job shows that the NFL head coaching position is destined to evolve into something that is more akin to a CEO - with less focus on actual coaching and in favor of running the organization with big-picture decisions.
The Cleveland Browns want to interview Condoleezza Rice to be their next head coach, according to Adam Schefter of ESPN.
"Browns general manager John Dorsey said last week that he was opening to hiring a woman as Cleveland's next head coach, and there is one prominent name on the team's wish list to interview," Schefter wrote. "The Browns would like to interview former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice for their head-coaching job, a league source tells ESPN."
It is unknown if Rice would want to interview or if the Browns would even hire her for the job. However, according to Schefter, the Browns would like to speak with her about what she could bring to the position and the organization. The interview could also lead to a different role with the team.
While the report was met with skepticism and laughs of "it's just the Browns being the Browns," the move may not be as crazy as it sounds if you consider that the job of "head coach" in the NFL is evolving and at some point, it will look nothing like the position with which we are all familiar.
In the not-too-distant future, NFL head coaches will be less like coaches and more like CEOs. Likely, teams will hire people - possibly under the title of "President of Football Operations" - to make all the crucial decisions, deal with the media and the public, and leave 95% of the actual coaching to the coordinators and position coaches.
The position of "head coach" would essentially cease to exist.
To a certain extent, we have already seen this in Major League Baseball, where people like Andrew Friedman of the Los Angeles Dodgers and Theo Epstein of the Chicago Cubs put the teams together and predetermine most of the managerial decisions before a game has even started even though neither is ever in the dugout. The difference in those cases is that a manager is still the public face of the team.
We have also seen something similar at the college level where coaches like Bobby Bowden and Joe Paterno did little or no actual coaching towards the ends of the careers and were more like figureheads when it came to the actual games.
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In the NFL, the evolution has already begun. Offensive and defensive coordinators typically call plays and run their respective sides of the ball. During practices, position coaches do most of the coaching
During games, NFL head coaches are often limited to deciding when to go for it on fourth down and yelling at the officials. Most of their job is done off the field, especially for coaches like Bill Belichick of the New England Patriots who are given more control and autonomy over the team and the organization, something that Rice would likely have.
None of this means Rice, who is a former member of the College Football Playoff selection committee, will ever be an NFL head coach. But that she is a candidate should not come as a surprise as it is just another example of how the job of head coach is changing, and soon, the position we are all familiar with may disappear forever.