Eric Williams
NFL reporter
Los Angeles Rams coach Sean McVay competed in opposition to Pete Carroll’s Seattle Seahawks twice a 12 months for seven seasons. Every time the 2 met, McVay anticipated a combat.
So McVay has in-depth data of the kind of ultra-competitive, related groups Carroll has constructed in additional than 50 years as a school and NFL coach.
“Football can be higher with Pete Carroll,” McVay instructed FOX Sports. “He’s a man I’ve appeared as much as… the values and ideas he represents that we have tried to mimic and emulate. You’ll get nothing however respect from me in direction of him.”
Carroll and the Seahawks parted methods after 14 seasons following a 2023 marketing campaign by which he completed 9-8, narrowly lacking the playoffs. Carroll, who turns 74 in September, taught a management course at USC that led to 2 nationwide championships throughout his 9 seasons there since leaving the NFL.
According to experiences, Carroll needs to return to teaching and has proven curiosity within the Chicago Bears’ vacant head teaching place. The Bears are reportedly taken with assembly him.
The Bears must be taken with among the finest tradition builders in professional soccer. Chicago had an opportunity to rent somebody of comparable stature a 12 months in the past, however handed up the possibility to rent Jim Harbaugh.
Instead, Harbaugh grew to become the coach of the Los Angeles Chargers and took them to the playoffs in his first season. Carroll might have an identical affect on the Bears. Yes, he is 12 years older than Harbaugh, however vitality has by no means been a difficulty for the all the time optimistic Carroll.
The Bears shouldn’t as soon as once more cross up the chance to herald among the finest coaches to ever stroll the bench. They ought to rent Carroll.
After burning by 5 totally different coaches within the final decade and with no playoff win because the 2010 season, the Bears want somebody with a championship pedigree to repair the dysfunction throughout the group. Carroll modified the tradition at each USC and the Seahawks, main each groups to championships.
Carroll is synonymous with victory. Seattle has received 5 NFC West titles and made the playoffs in 10 of its 14 seasons. Seattle has by no means missed the postseason in consecutive years underneath Carroll. He received at the very least 9 video games in 11 of his final 12 seasons in Seattle, together with consecutive Super Bowl appearances in 2013 and 2014, profitable all of it after the 2013 season.
Carroll has an general file of 170-120-1 within the common season and 11-11 within the postseason in 18 years as an NFL head coach. His 181 mixed victories rank seventeenth in league historical past.
(Read extra: Pete Carroll on 50 years of teaching: “Keep curious, hold understanding who you’re”)
The prevailing principle is that the Bears are taken with hiring a coach with an offensive background to get essentially the most out of No. 1 decide Caleb Williams. No, Carroll is not an offensive coach, however he is nonetheless a quarterback whisperer, in keeping with Matt Hasselbeck, who was Carroll’s first beginning QB with the Seahawks.
“We like to present credit score to all these offensive coaches for a way properly their quarterback carried out,” Hasselbeck instructed FOX Sports. “And generally when a defensive coach does an important job with a quarterback, we do not give him any credit score.
“I do know enjoying for Pete, regardless that there have been some rising pains and issues like that for me, there have been some actually good issues that helped me so much.”
Dianna Russini on the assembly between Pete Carroll and Caleb WIlliams
Carroll is aware of methods to get the perfect out of his quarterbacks. Just take a look at the success he had with Russell Wilson and Geno Smith in Seattle. Wilson, an undersized QB who the Seahawks chosen within the third spherical, had his greatest NFL seasons underneath Carroll, whereas Smith loved a resurgence and made the Pro Bowl as Wilson’s alternative.
And at USC underneath Carroll, Carson Palmer, Mark Sanchez and Matt Leinart all grew to become top-10 draft picks.
Because of his defensive background, Carroll has in-depth data of methods to mentor quarterbacks, so they’re assured and get essentially the most out of their talents. And he would take a measured, affected person strategy to growing Williams, who has proven promise this season amid the Bears’ struggles.
“It’s such laborious work,” Carroll mentioned of the quarterback place. “Everything you do so as to add one thing and make it tougher simply makes them work at a decrease stage. It’s all a part of that sort of considering, and it is the strategy to the sport and the best way you construct your workforce.
“That’s why I discuss concerning the working sport on a regular basis. Everyone thinks I’m loopy. Well, that is not the case in any respect. It’s to make the sport higher for our quarterback and to make our workforce higher. It’s all about philosophy and an strategy that ties into the QB place, I really feel like I’m teaching the quarterback the entire time.
Carroll would additionally create unifying organizational stability by his skill to create robust relationships with gamers and different employees members. And he is not afraid to make drastic, substantive modifications, as evidenced by the 284 roster transactions the Seahawks made in his first 12 months, an NFL file on the time.
There are definitely query marks surrounding Carroll’s hiring. Can he deal with the trials of being an NFL coach at age 74, and what would the succession plan be if he had been to maneuver on after a number of seasons? How a lot personnel management would you require as a head coach, and the way would you’re employed in live performance with GM Ryan Poles and workforce president Kevin Warren?
Here’s one other key query: Who would Carroll herald as offensive coordinator? That individual, who will work carefully with Williams, might be crucial to Chicago’s success. The Bears employed and fired Shane Waldron, Carroll’s former OC in Seattle, this season.
Darrell Bevell or Brian Schottenheimer, different former Seahawks offensive coordinators, might make sense. Or maybe Carroll would look to herald an rising offensive thoughts to assist develop Williams.
But these are obstacles that Carroll has the background to beat. In the perfect division in soccer – with gifted coaches Dan Campbell, Matt LaFleur and Kevin O’Connell – the Bears would have a coach in Carroll who might compete instantly, offering a charismatic presence that might draw nationwide consideration.
And extra importantly, it will construct a profitable tradition that the Bears have not had in years.
Eric D. Williams has reported on the NFL for greater than a decade, overlaying the Los Angeles Rams for Sports Illustrated, the Los Angeles Chargers for ESPN e Seattle Seahawks for the Tacoma News Tribune. Follow him on Twitter at @eric_d_williams.
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