Before and after Browns president Mike Holmgren fired coach Eric Mangini, the Big Show had been dropping big hints about the possibility that the best man for the job could be the man deciding who will fill it. In the end, Holmgren hired Pat Shurmur.
But Holmgren tells Dave “Softy” Mahler of KJR in Seattle that the former Packers and Seahawks coach ran the idea of coaching the Browns past his staff -- and his staff agreed. In the end, Holmgren decided against it after talking to his wife and “pray[ing] about it a little bit.”
The full audio is available at the KJR website.
Though it’s unclear whether he’ll ever coach again, the fact that Shurmur has no offensive coordinator and will be calling the plays bolsters our belief that Holmgren will have a large wooden spoon in the stew -- something that Shurmur surely knew when he agreed to take the job.
Given Holmgren’s accomplishments, Shurmur surely isn’t complaining, either.