Could the Seahawks go back to a job share at offensive coordinator?
Could the head man who once had that arrangement in Seattle return to coaching elsewhere in the NFL next season?
The Seahawks’ new offensive coordinator coach that Mike Macdonald has been searching for since he fired Ryan Grubb 16 days ago could be co-offensive coordinators. Seattle is considering a running-game coordinator and a passing-game coordinator to perhaps share the new job. That’s according to a report Wednesday by Sports Illustrated’s Albert Breer.
Macdonald said Jan. 7, the day after he fired Grubb, he may get creative in this hire.
“For the new coordinator...it’s not just like, ‘Hey, I have to have A, B, and C.’ We want to have an open mind,” Macdonald said.
“We want to try to find the best fit for our football team and the guys we have on offense right now.”
Macdonald and the Seahawks have been interested in Detroit Lions offensive line coach Hank Fraley all month. They had a second interview with Fraley, in person, Tuesday. That was three days after Fraley’s Lions got eliminated from the NFC playoffs by Washington in the divisional round.
Macdonald’s first priority in hiring a new offensive coordinator is to build a running game far more physical and consistent than it was under Grubb this past season, to match what he wants the entire team’s mentality to be. Seattle was 28th in rushing offense and 29th in rushing attempts in the 32-team league in 2024, despite being middle of the NFL, 17th, in yards per carry.
“We want our offense to be a physical unit and dictate terms of the defense, play complementary football and get the ball to our play-makers frequently and in space, and let our quarterback play fast,” Macdonald said two weeks ago. “We were doing a lot of those things offensively.”
Fraley, 47, is renowned building Detroit’s steamrolling offensive line and its dynamic running game; it remained among the league’s best this past season. But he has less apparent experience with perimeter passing game and nuances of meshing exacting route running by wide receivers with drop-back steps and timing of quarterbacks’ throws.
That’s where a passing-game coordinator comes in. Seattle had one this past season; Jake Peetz was that for quarterback Geno Smith. Peetz was considered to be the internal candidate Macdonald may think about to replace Grubb as offensive coordinator.
That is, until Macdonald said the day after he fired Grubb there are no internal candidates to replace him.
Breer mentioned in his SI report Scott Turner, the 42-year-old son of long-time NFL coach and offensive play caller Norv Turner, to watch for as a possible new Seahawks passing-game coordinator.
With coaching staffs ever expanding — those salaries aren’t subject to a league salary cap, as are players’ — many NFL teams have passing-game coordinators and running-game coordinators. But those are typically second and third assistants to an offensive coordinator. The OC takes the pass- and run-game input to form each game plan and call the plays in the games.
Yet the Seahawks have done the job share before. Pete Carroll did it from 2011 through the ‘17 seasons. Darrell Bevell was Carroll’s second offensive coordinator, after Carroll fired Jeremy Bates following his only season in the job. Grubb this month became the first Seattle OC fired after just one year since Bates, also after the new head coach’s first season in charge.
Tom Cable was the assistant head coach, offensive line coach and running-game coordinator. He designed the blocking schemes and many running plays. Bevell and Cable often called their respective plays during games in those seven seasons, which spanned the Seahawks’ consecutive Super Bowls and only NFL title at the end of the 2013 season.
Bevell, by title and practice, was the primary play caller for those Seahawks teams.
The obvious, practical question in this proposed job share under Macdonald is: Who would have the ultimate play-calling authority and responsibility? There would appear to be a need for one, to reduce confusion in games, specifically between plays. A quarterback is not used to hearing two voices calling plays through his helmet speaker during possessions.
That is why Macdonald is looking beyond this possible job share for his new offensive coordinator, a more conventional, single one. He’s twice interviewed 37-year-old Klint Kubiak, who is on his way out from New Orleans as the Saints get ready to hire a new head coach and staff.
Seattle’s other second interview came Friday with Grant Udinski, the 28-year-old assistant offensive coordinator and assistant quarterbacks coach. Minnesota head man Kevin O’Connell is said to have increasingly relied on Udinski during Minnesota’s 14-win season in 2024.
Speaking of Pete Carroll...
League sources from Las Vegas, the Dallas area and the San Francisco Bay Area have been talking to The News Tribune this week about Carroll.
The 73-year-old coach Macdonald replaced 12 months ago in charge of the Seahawks is believed to be a candidate for the head job with the Las Vegas Raiders. There is talk the Cowboys may want to talk to Carroll about its head-coaching vacancy.
NFL Media reported Dallas leaders had a second interview Wednesday with Brian Schottenheimer, their offensive coordinator the last three seasons, about the Cowboys head job.
Also Wednesday, Tim Kawakami reported in the San Francisco Standard “Carroll’s name has come up inside 49ers HQ as an interested idea” to possibly be San Francisco’s new defensive coordinator. The 49ers’ first choice for that is believed to be Robert Saleh, a former Carroll assistant with the Seahawks whom the New York Jets fired as their head coach during the 2024 season.
Carroll is more interested in coaching in the NFL for 2025 than he was in 2024, because the Seahawks are no longer paying him. They gave him $15 million during this past season, the final year of his contract extension he signed in 2020 but didn’t totally fulfill.
