Sports360AZ
Welcome to another episode of “As The Cardinals Head Coaching Search Turns.”
Seahawks offensive coordinator Darrell Bevell is the latest name to be linked to the vacant Cardinals head coaching position, after former Broncos offensive coordinator Mike McCoy was named Chargers head coach on Tuesday.
Bevell would seem to be a good fit for the Cardinals.
After all, Bevell worked with and developed some very good quarterbacks in his time with the Packers [Brett Favre] and Seahawks [Russell Wilson].
Of course, who can forget the 58-0 pasting the Seahawks laid on the Cardinals this season? Bevell obviously had a huge hand in that as Seattle’s OC.
Plus Bevell has ties to the Valley. He’s from Scottsdale, Ariz., and he attended Chaparral High School.
He also spent a redshirt freshman season at NAU before leaving for a two-year Mormon mission.
So there’s the local link.
Bevell is a very hot commodity right now, as both the Bears and Jaguars have shown interest in him as well.
You can cross the Bears off the list, as they’ve reportedly named former Montreal Alouettes head coach Marc Trestman as their head coach.
So that narrows things down a bit for Bevell, which may be to the Cardinals advantage. Less competition now for them.
My only concern with Bevell is if the Cardinals are really enamored with him and they think he’s the one, then they need to come out and be more aggressive than they were with Andy Reid and McCoy and not let Bevell leave the Tempe facility without naming him Cardinals head coach.
Unless they’re doing their due diligence, which is all well and good. Eventually though, due diligence without a moderate bit of aggression can leave you high and dry in this search.
Another name that’s been linked to the Cardinals, per NFL.com, is Colts offensive coordinator Bruce Arians, who, along with Bevell, was one of the finalists for the Bears head coaching job before they moved ahead with Trestman.
The Cardinals have reportedly asked permission to speak to Arians about their vacancy, which begs the question, “Where does Ray Horton fit in all of this?”
Horton was the first candidate to interview with team president Michael Bidwill, not knowing the laundry list of names that would follow afterwards.
Either it’s due diligence on the team’s part, or maybe they’re not sold on Horton being the head coach here, but you’ve got to wonder what’s going through Horton’s mind right now as the Cardinals are set to bring both Bevell and Arians through the Tempe facility in the next few days for talks.
