When ESPN hired Rex Ryan this spring, I wasn't surprised. That's what ESPN does: Hire big-name coaches fresh off the field or court who can talk about today's players and coaching.
Now I think Ryan might be an insurance policy in case Jon Gruden bolts "Monday Night Football" to return to the NFL as a coach.
Gruden, the Super Bowl-winning coach, raised eyebrows this week during an interview in which he talked about returning to the league where he coached for 19 seasons.
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"I’ve met with several people – I won't deny that," Gruden told PewterReport.com. “People — just about every year I talk about coming back to coach. I'm not in here every day at 4:30 or 4 in the morning watching pinball, you know?
"I'm preparing myself to come back. I am. Every day. I’m preparing to come back."
Say what, Chuckie?
Guys like Gruden don't say stuff like that unless they want to be courted by NFL teams seeking new coaches. Despite being away from the league since 2009, the 53-year-old could write his own ticket with a franchise.
Enter the outspoken, boisterous Ryan, who joins ESPN's revamped "Sunday NFL Countdown" this season.
The 54-year-old former Jets and Bills coach has a made-for-TV personality; he's funny and authentic. His NFL head coaching career is probably over, which makes him more likely to embrace the dark side of TV. He fills one of the most important criteria for ESPN's recent hires: He's fresh off the field.
"We also look forward to the insight and perspective he will bring to the show as an NFL coach who has worked in the league for two decades,” said Seth Markman, senior coordinating producer for ESPN’s NFL studio shows, when he announced Ryan's hire April 3.
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NFL insider Gary Myers of the New York Daily News thinks Ryan could be the "next" John Madden. I agree with Myers that Ryan would be better as a game analyst than he would be as one of multiple talking heads in a studio.
Writes Myers:
"I think he will be much better doing games than in the studio. He has a lot of Madden in him: Entertaining, an everyman appeal, a big, jolly guy who doesn’t take himself too seriously and loves to talk football. If Ryan excels in what could be looked at as a one-game audition, maybe ESPN adds him to some Monday Night games this year to prop up Jon Gruden, who has grown stale, and who knows, maybe replace Gruden next year."
Although it received a much stronger MNF schedule from the league this season, ESPN still has the weakest competitive game schedule of all the league TV partners.
Gruden might be tired of never calling a Super Bowl at ESPN. The Worldwide Leader in Sports might be tired of paying him $6.5 million per year at a time when it's cutting 100 on-air staffers and losing millions of subscribers.
That makes Gruden ESPN's highest-paid employee, according to James Andrew Miller, co-author of "Those Guys Have All the Fun: Inside the World of ESPN."
Back in 2014, Gruden signed a contract extension that will keep him at ESPN through the 2021 season. ESPN is not worried about its MNF game analyst.
"Jon remains committed to ESPN and is looking forward to the start of the Monday Night Football season," spokesman Bill Hofheimer told Sporting News.
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But Gruden is still a young man compared to some NFL coaches. He's 12 years younger than the 65-year-old Bill Belichick of the Patriots and Pete Carroll of the Seahawks. Maybe that one Super Bowl he won with the Buccaneers back in 2003 is not enough for him.
I'll be watching closely to see if Ryan can fill Gruden's chair this season.
And if Gruden is really serious about chasing another ring in the NFL.
