When the Raiders fired Jack Del Rio after Sunday’s loss to the Chargers ended their season with a 6-10 record, there was no rush of reports about candidates to replace him on the sideline.
The reason for that is because every indication under the sun is that Jon Gruden is returning to his former job just as soon as the Raiders figure out a way to satisfy the Rooney Rule by interviewing a minority candidate for the job. In comments to Jerry McDonald of the Bay Area News Group, Gruden tried his best to make his getting the job seem like something other than a sure thing.
“My understanding is they’re interviewing candidates this week and they’re going to let everybody know sometime early next week or whenever they make their decision,” Gruden said. “Well, I think I am being considered, yes. I hope I’m a candidate.”
With no move to the Raiders yet official, Gruden will continue in his role as an ESPN analyst for Saturday’s Wild Card game between the Titans and Chiefs. While Gruden might be playing it coy, we’ll see how much those teams cooperate with Gruden given the belief that he’ll be competing with them in the near future.