Seahawks’ coach search is GM John Schneider’s first, biggest hire. Which way will he go?
For 14 years, he’s been a partner. A “co-.” Not the top Seahawks authority.
That just changed.
John Schneider is no longer one of the only general managers in the NFL who works under, not over, a coach that has ultimate final authority on all the team’s football matters.
Wednesday, team chair Jody Allen and her right-hand man Bert Kolde fired Pete Carroll after 14 seasons as the Seahawks’ coach and executive vice president. They made Schneider the franchise’s top football decision-maker instead, to change the Seahawks’ decision-making.
For the first time in his career, it’s on Schneider first.
“I’m so excited for you to have this opportunity,” Carroll said, fighting back tears as he was addressing the GM during the coach’s press conference that ended the most successful coaching tenure in Seahawks history.
“It’s going to be cool.”
Schneider, standing on the side of the main auditorium at team headquarters, cleared his throat and said, “love you, Pete.”
Schneider has been Carroll’s operating partner without final say — a marriage, Carroll called it — since Carroll helped late owner Paul Allen hire Schneider as a first-time GM in January 2010. That was a little over a week after Allen hired Carroll and gave him the keys to the franchise.
Those keys now belong to the 52-year-old Schneider, the one-time personnel executive with the Washington Redskins and his hometown Green Bay Packers.
“This is a good move for them,” Carroll said. “And Johnny’s going to take this thing, take the bull by the horns and roll. I’m so thankful that I get to see him take that next step and watch what he does with it.
“He’s going to kick butt.”
Schneider’s first task: Find a coach who can beat the San Francisco 49ers’ and the Los Angeles Rams’ butts. If not, the Seahawks aren’t getting out of the NFC West. They aren’t getting home playoff games. They aren’t going back to the Super Bowl.
And they will likely be looking for a new coach again in a few years, perhaps before Schneider’s GM contract with Allen ends with the 2026 NFL draft.
“It’s been 14 years. He’s been waiting for his opportunity, and he deserves it,” Carroll said. “And he’s great at what he does.
“And now he’s going to find out. Find out, big fella.”
Schneider’s first job is the biggest move of his career so far: Hiring Carroll’s replacement to coach the Seahawks.
And it will all be Schneider’s call, with Jody Allen’s approval.
Allen’s statement this past week relieving Carroll of his duties mentioned the now-former Seattle coach will have an “advisory” role with the team. But the day he got fired, Carroll didn’t sound all that “freakin’ jacked,” as he would put it, about staying around much as a Seahawks advisor.
“We’ll see what happens,” Carroll said.
Friday, on KIRO-AM radio, the 72-year-old Carroll did not rule out coaching somehwhere else. But he thinks that’s unlikely.
“I don’t know that,” Carroll said. “I’ve got plenty of energy for it and thought and willingness, but I can’t imagine there’s a place, the right one.
“I don’t know. I’m open to everything, but I’m not holding my breath on that.”
So it’s up to Schneider to replace him in Seattle.
The process is likely to take a couple weeks, at least.
NFL interview rules
If Schneider and the Seahawks want to hire a current NFL coach, league rules dictate how they must do that as the playoffs go on.
First, the Seahawks must adhere to the “Rooney Rule,” the NFL requirement that teams must interview, in person, at least two external candidates who are people of color or women.
That, and the fact he was renowned as the Kansas City Chiefs’ offensive coordinator with quarterback Patrick Mahomes through the 2022 season, is why Washington Commanders play caller Eric Bieniemy is likely to get a Seahawks interview. Seattle may also interview Steve Wilks, the coordinator of the San Francisco 49ers defense that has dominated the Seahawks the last couple seasons and in last year’s playoffs.
In October, the league passed anti-tampering rules to keep assistant coaches on playoff teams from leaving their clubs to do interviews with other teams for head-coaching vacancies. The new rules also keep the league’s news focused on the playoff games, and less on new coaching hires. The rules keep the Seahawks from “conducting in-person Head Coach interviews with candidates who are employed by other NFL clubs until after the conclusion of all Divisional Playoff games.” The division round ends next weekend, the night of Jan. 21.
The Seahawks can do in-person interviews with candidates on Carroll’s staff that ended the 2023 season last weekend, or with any candidate who is from college football or otherwise not working in the NFL.
Schneider and Seattle’s team leaders can start doing virtual and phone interviews with NFL candidates, including those on teams that are in the wild-card round, from the end of this weekend until Jan. 21. But they are unlikely to hire a person they haven’t first talked to in person, inside Seahawks headquarters in Renton.
Starting with after the division round, that is, Jan. 22, the Seahawks cannot have initial interviews with candidates employed by any of the four teams that advance to the conference championship games, not until the candidate’s team has its season end. Second interviews are not permitted until Jan. 29.
Seahawks’ candidates: Defense
Schneider’s choice for a new coach will show whether he wants what’s been familiar to the players, the majority of the roster that is under contract for 2024 and will return in Seattle next season, or go in a completely new direction.
For familiarity, for what essentially would be an extension of Carroll’s ways, especially on defense, Schneider would choose Dan Quinn. The former defensive coordinator for the Seahawks during their Super Bowl seasons of 2013 and ‘14 was Carroll’s defensive line coach for Seattle in 2010. Quinn left the Seahawks after their second consecutive Super Bowl and leading the NFL in defense, to coach the Atlanta Falcons before the 2015 season. He coached the Falcons into the Super Bowl in his second season as a head coach.
The Falcons fired Quinn off their 0-5 start to the 2020 season. He was 46-44, including 3-2 in the postseason, as Atlanta’s head coach. He’s been the defensive coordinator of the Dallas Cowboys the last three season. Dallas is the NFC East champion and opened its postseason Sunday against Green Bay. Quinn’s Cowboys ranked fifth in the NFL in total defense this past season.
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Former Seahawks Pro Bowl and Super Bowl linebacker K.J. Wright, who in 2015 called Quinn, 53, “a defensive mastermind,” is one of many around Seattle who knows who he wants the team to hire to replace Carroll.
“There’s only one name that I’m thinking of,” Wright told CBS Sports’ Zach Gelb this past week. “There’s no other names besides Dan Quinn. He’s the guy.”
But if the Seahawks wanted a continuation of the Carroll way, the Carroll defensive system that was ranked at the bottom of the NFL again this past season, wouldn’t they have just kept Carroll? He was under contract through next season with an option for 2025.
Carroll himself didn’t make it sound as if Allen and Schneider want a continuation of the same system.
“Following our season-ending meetings with ownership, in the planning sessions, it’s clear that, for a variety of reasons, we have mutually agreed to set a new course, and for the club to take on new leadership,” Carroll said. “That’s just a decision that’s been made.”
If Schneider wants to stay with a defense-first head coach, Mike Vrabel is the most NFL-accomplished one available for hire. The Tennessee Titans fired Vrabel, 48, the 2021 Associated Press NFL coach of the year, this past week in a surprise move. His Titans went 12-5 in 2021, 7-10 in 2022 and 6-11 with a load of close losses this season.
Vrabel’s Titans were first in the NFL against the run in 2022 and seventh in yards allowed per rush this past season. The Seahawks have been 30th against the run in each of the last two seasons.
Vrabel, a former New England Patriots linebacker who had a 14-year NFL playing career, seemed to some to fit replacing ousted Bill Belichick as the Patriots’ new coach. But they reportedly never contacted him while hiring Jerod Mayo, another former New England player, on Friday.
Baltimore Ravens defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald led the AFC North-champion Ravens defense that led the NFL in fewest points allowed in the regular season. Macdonald’s unit allowed just three points while thrashing the Seahawks in Baltimore by 34 points in November.
Macdonald would be a young whiz-kid hire from defense, as the Los Angeles Chargers did a few years ago with Brandon Staley, whom they recently fired. Macdonald is 36 years old. He was Jim Harbaugh’s defensive coordinator at Michigan in 2021. Before that he was a Ravens defensive assistant for seven years, including as a linebackers and defensive line coach.
Seahawks’ candidates: Offense
Will Schneider want leadership so new it’s a head coach with an offensive background, after 14 years of Carroll’s background?
The most proven, big-name coach that could be available, from an offensive background?
Jim Harbaugh.
Remember him? The former San Francisco 49ers Super Bowl coach came within Richard Sherman’s tipped pass in the end zone late in the NFC championship game in January 2014 from going to a Super Bowl off the Seahawks’ home field a decade ago. Harbaugh and his Michigan Wolverines just beat the Washington Huskies in the national championship last week.
Folks in and around the Michigan program in Houston for the title game last week were nervous Harbaugh has yet to sign a standing offer Michigan’s had for its coach for weeks. It’s reported to be 10 years at $12.5 million per year. With a bonus for winning the national title, Harbaugh earned more than $11 million for the 2023 college season.
Yes, Harbaugh and Carroll were arch-enemies when Harbaugh coached Stanford and Carroll USC in the 2000s.
M Live reported Harbaugh’s buyout from his Michigan deal went down Thursday contractually from $2.25 million to just $1.5 million.
Money is no impediment for the Seahawks. The Paul G. Allen Trust that owns the Seahawks is one of the world’s richest, deepest accounts. And unlike for players, there is no NFL salary cap for coaches.
Paul Allen hired only big names, as Harbaugh is, as coaches after he bought the Seahawks in 1997: Mike Holmgren (1999), Jim Mora (2009), Carroll (2010). Schneider choosing and Jody Allen approving Harbaugh would follow family precedent.
Dave Canales would be the offensive version of a Quinn-like hire. Canales, 42, is in the playoffs in his first season as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ offensive coordinator. He was an assistant for Carroll with the Seahawks the previous 13 seasons. He was Russell Wilson’s quarterback coach with Seattle in 2018-19 and again in 2022. In between he was Carroll’s passing-game coordinator.
The hottest young assistant in the NFL is Ben Johnson. The 37-year-old offensive coordinator of the NFC North-champion Detroit Lions would be in the league’s trend of Sean McVay, Kyle Shananan, Mike McDaniel hires: young, innovative play callers turned first-time head coaches.
Johnson reportedly is the top choice of the Commanders, who fired coach Ron Rivera last week.
Yes, the Seahawks competing with six other teams also in the market for a new head coach.
The second-hottest young offensive whiz in the NFL is Bobby Slowik, the 36-year-old play caller who has guided rookie quarterback C.J. Stroud and the Houston Texans into next weekend’s division round of the playoffs. He was a defensive assistant in his first NFL coaching job, with Washington from 2011-13, a job that began two years after he graduated from college, Michigan Tech. He moved to offense as an assistant for the 49ers in 2017. He’s been the Texans’ offensive coordinator for just one season.
The Falcons, Commanders, Panthers and Titans reportedly have asked the Texans for permission to interview Slowik.
Odds on the next Seahawks coach
The News Tribune’s odds for who we see as most to least likely to become the next Seahawks coach (for recreational purposes only, of course!):
Mike Vrabel 3-1
Ben Johnson 5-1
Dan Quinn 5-1
Jim Harbaugh 10-1
Dave Canales 10-1
Bobby Slowik 12-1
Mike Macdonald 12-1
Eric Bieniemy 15-1
Steve Wilks 15-1
Raheem Morris 20-1
Brian Flores 30-1
Dan Lanning 75-1
Anyone not on this list 75-1
Steve Sarkisian 80-1
Chip Kelly 90-1
Mike Tomlin 100-1
Lane Kiffin 150-1
Ryan Day 450-1
Kalen DeBoer 500-1
This story was originally published January 14, 2024 at 5:30 AM.
