Soon, six to eight NFL head coaching positions will be vacant and team owners will be handing out permits to rival teams to interview their talented coaches.
And whether or not an owner has his eye on a specific candidate, it would simply be good business to cast the widest possible net due to NFL rules regarding interview deadlines.
The NFL recommends teams try to interview — whether in person or virtually — as many candidates as possible in the coming weeks so they aren’t stuck once the conference championship games are played. It’s a rule that put the Arizona Cardinals in a tough spot last year, and it’s one that these other teams should look to avoid in 2024.
Only second interviews with coaching candidates whose teams are playing in conference championship week will be permitted that week. Teams therefore have part of this week and all of the following week to conduct their first interviews before potentially having to wait until after the Super Bowl on February 11.
If a team would like to interview a head coaching candidate currently employed by another team but not in the playoffs, they can do so virtually midweek this week. This schedule also applies to the Ravens and 49ers coaches, who each have a first-round bye. If this coach is on another playoff team, he cannot interview until the wild card game has been played. By the way, all of these interviews would be virtual.
Once the calendar reads Jan. 22, teams will be able to interview the same coaches employed by other clubs in person. NFL owners passed a resolution this year to push back in-person interviews by a week in an effort to slow down the hiring process.
But once we get to the conference title games, that’s where things change. If a team has not conducted an initial interview with a candidate and that coach’s team is playing in the conference championship game, they cannot conduct an initial interview (in person or virtually) until the end of this team’s season.
Essentially, if you don’t connect virtually with a coach between the middle of next week and January 22 and his team is in the conference championship game, you can’t talk to him until his team loses in the conference championship or won/lost the Super Bowl.
This is the problem the Cardinals faced last year during their head coaching hiring process. The team hired Monti Ossenfort as general manager on January 16, during the week of divisional round games. As he was gaining his footing, the Eagles were headed to the conference championship game, and after that, the Cardinals were unable to request an initial interview with then-Eagles defensive coordinator Jonathan Gannon.
Arizona had to wait until after Philadelphia’s season, which was the Super Bowl, before it could interview Gannon. They did, of course, but the league ultimately ruled that the Cardinals had tampered with Gannon by contacting him during an unauthorized period and were ultimately stripped of mid-round draft status.
Suffice it to say, interview requests will be coming in over the next few days, as teams with vacancies hope to get an initial interview with multiple candidates so they don’t get stuck in two weeks.
