Next Steps for the Tennessee Titans

The Tennessee Titans have their Head Coach. So, what's next for the team?

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When the Titans fired Mike Vrabel, Amy Adams-Strunk came under a lot of fire. Not only from fans and local media, but also shots fired from me as well. The stuff I have called her out on is still correct. She has had tremendously suspect and bad processes throughout her tenure. Just on the football side of things, but it is correct to point that out.

However, like I pointed out the bad processes, I also pointed out the good results. While the results verdict will be undecided on Brian Callahan, the process seems to indicate that Adams-Strunk got her guy, and this was the guy she had in mind since the firing of Vrabel.

So, she and Ran both got the top pick among their head coaching candidates, what’s next?

The Gray Area of the Promotions

When it was announced that Brian Callahan had been requested to be interviewed for the Titans head coaching position, everyone, and I do mean everyone, made the point that Bill Callahan could be offensive line coach, but would need an additional title or title bump so the Browns couldn’t block the hire.

Now that he’s hired, people have come out of left field saying that he would need to be offensive coordinator. So, where did this come from all of a sudden? Well, it comes from a few articles and a people’s interpretation of one part of a larger rule. So, let’s break it down.

Before 2020, NFL teams could block any assistant from taking another job, even if it was a promotion. For example, if Charles London, who is a QB coach, wanted to be OC somewhere, the Titans could block them prior to the rule change. To circumvent this rule, the hiring team would slap on the title of Assistant Head Coach to the coordinator position. Thus making it a fake title with no real responsibilities. So, to combat this issue, the league decided that as long as it was a promotion there wouldn’t be need to create fake titles to promote an assistant coach to a coordinator position.

So, where does that leave an assistant coach getting a job elsewhere that is not the title of Offensive, Defensive, or Special teams coordinator? The real answer is that no one really knows. It isn’t truly defined in the rule because the rule is specifically discussing Coordinator positions, not lateral moves with a title bump. Remember, the original intent of the 2020 rule:

Effect: Establishes a system after the conclusion of the regular season, that prohibits a club:

(i) from denying an assistant coach the opportunity to interview with a new team for a bona fide Offensive Coordinator, Defensive Coordinator, or Special Teams Coordinator position – In a press release from nflcommunications.com

In layman’s term, you can’t deny an assistant coach from being a coordinator. The entirety of the rule, which you can see here, says nothing about assistant coaches being given a title bump. However, we can glean insight from three recent hires:

• Scottie Montgomery: Colts Running Back Coach -> Lions Assistant Head Coach/Running Backs Coach

• Charles London: Falcons Quarterbacks Coach -> Titans Quarterbacks Coach/Pass Game Coordinator

• Chris Harris: Commanders Defensive Backs Coach -> Titans Defensive Pass Game Coordinator/Cornerbacks Coach.

Joel Erickson, IndyStar.com, reported this when Montgomery was hired by the Lions:

Montgomery landed a promotion — NFL teams can’t block assistant coaches from taking a job that’s a step up from their current role — but Indianapolis has reportedly blocked defensive coordinator Gus Bradley from pursuing other opportunities so far, Sports Illustrated reported Monday.

NFL ownership is known for allowing itself a lot of gray area. This is a perfect example of looking at a rule and misunderstanding what the rule says or how it is implemented. Again, the rule is about promoting tocoordinating positions, not how lateral moves with title bumps work. From what we know looking at the examples above, the title bump should work in theory.

I have found nothing to say otherwise, and people connected to the league pretty much can’t agree, which means there is a large gray area. So, if you see Bill Callahan hired as an OL Coach/(Insert Title Here) that should tell us that for Assistant Coaches moving to Assistant Coach positions, a title bump or add-on is considered a promotion. So, until we have a more declarative statement from NFL HQ, I think we can file this under: No one knows.

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