Eric Bieniemy’s lack of job offers defies logic

Now that each head-coaching vacancy has been filled, it’s clear Eric Bieniemy will not be an NFL head coach in 2021. I do not know why.

When I say “I don’t know,” I don’t mean to be cute or glib. The fact is the behind-the-scenes mechanics of head-coaching hires are invisible to all besides the candidate, his agent and the hiring team’s front office. But it sure is odd, I can say that much.

With the news that the Houston Texans-the last available opening-hired David Culley to replace Bill O’Brien, this officially marks two straight years where Bieniemy has entered the hiring cycle as a top candidate and exited without a job offer. Before I say anything more, I want to appreciate how surprising this development is. Hold onto any reasons, any explanations for a second. However prescient or accurate those explanations may be, it remains true that the fact that Bieniemy, who many (including me) thought would have his pick of a job, will not be hired.

How should we interpret the Bieniemy news?

It’s impossible to explain why Eric Bieniemy doesn’t have a head coaching job.

Many, in an attempt to make sense of it, will provide a rationale. One possibility is that Bieniemy is not the primary play caller for the Chiefs, which means he is a riskier hire than we assume. Someone may also cite the fact that the Chiefs’ postseason success has hampered Bieniemy’s availability for interviews and visits. After all, Bieniemy has been quite busy preparing a team for a repeat Super Bowl victory during the period where most candidates visit teams or engage in advanced interviews.

There is a problem, though, with speculating. When we try and construe reasons for why Bieniemy wasn’t hired, we forget that these very “reasons” haven’t stopped other coaches from being hired instead. Ultimately, brainstorming possible reasons is a moot exercise. Sure, it’s possible that Bieniemy’s limited play-calling experience was a substantial reason teams passed on him. Yet there’s no way of actually knowing if this was truly the deterrent to his candidacy, because plenty of head coaching hires are not play callers. We simply do not have the information to make those judgments, and the reasons we may come up with have not disqualified plenty of other candidates.

That doesn’t mean we can’t have a meaningful discussion about Bieniemy, though. It’s just, there’s a productive, fruitful discussion to be had, and an unproductive one. The unproductive side is full of assumptions about why Bieniemy’s wasn’t hired.

“Maybe he’s a poor interviewer?” Baseless.

“Well, maybe teams couldn’t fully engage with him since the Chiefs’ season is still going on?” Explain the hiring of past Super Bowl assistants like Brian Flores or Zac Taylor; Flores and Taylor were hired as head coaches during their respective teams’ championship run.

“How about that Bieniemy doesn’t call the majority of plays?”  Well, Neither did Dan Campbell, Joe Judge or Nick Sirianni.

“Bieniemy isn’t as important to the Chiefs success as Mahomes or Reid.” This, while true, is too hasty a statement to mean much in terms of Bieniemy’s prospective head coaching skill. It gets us into that annoying football trend where pundits feel the need to calculate exactly how much credit a given coach or player deserves. Think of the dreaded “Was it Brady or Belichick?” question.

My point is that any of these “reasons” may hold some validity. It’s just in bad faith to paint narratives without adequate information. It’s also unfair to Bieniemy, since this narrative-stoking could work to harm his future candidacy. It also might be off-base.

There’s another issue that arises when we search for reasons. We dwell on the perceived shortcomings Bieniemy must have. How could Bieniemy exit a second full hiring-cycle without a job? He must have some flaw that is driving all of this, right?

Consider this counterpoint: the NFL head-coaching cycle is far from pristine. It does not rely on a refined algorithm. The methodology speaks for itself: without fail, it seems, around five coaches are fired each year. Doesn’t this at least point the blame back at teams who clearly haven’t figured out a good way to hire new head coaches?

Now, the hirings are speculative in nature, with a heavy deal of risk. There are general diagnostics used to assess a candidate: perhaps ability as a play caller, as a developer, or as a motivator. Maybe it’s decision-making or intelligence or cultural fit, etc. While these diagnostics are helpful in assessing candidates, they don’t guarantee success as a head coach. Both Adam Gase and Hue Jackson were viewed as strong candidates back in 2016 thanks to their play-calling acumen and history of QB development. The point is simply that the methodology that front offices lean on don’t always predict success.

While there’s a temptation to hypothesize about what is “wrong” with Eric Bieniemy, we shouldn’t neglect the fact that the other side of the negotiations, are often flawed in how they assess coaches. So Bieniemy’s lack of opportunities do not automically imply that there’s something amiss in his candidacy. In short, maybe teams have just been consistently mistaken in not hiring him.

I don’t want to play the “why” game, though. I don’t want to spend 1,000 words trying to concoct some masterful reason for why Eric Bieniemy is not a head coach, because something about the exercise feels very self-serving. I don’t want to play the “why” game, because when I heard the news that Bieniemy would not be getting hired, my mind didn’t jump to a place of logic or deduction. It went to a place of sadness.

It feels wrong that Eric Bieniemy is not a head coaching. It feels wrong because Bieniemy has helped develop star running backs like Jamaal Charles, Maurice Jones-Drew and Kareem Hunt. It feels wrong because whenever Coach Bieniemy is speaking, he radiates a kind of resolve, confidence, and wisdom that I can only think reflects his coaching acumen. It feels wrong because even a fiery Deshaun Watson’s resonant endorsement of Bieniemy wasn’t enough to earn him the Houston job.

It feels wrong because head coach Andy Reid poignantly remarked that he wished his son could had the opportunity to be coached by Bieniemy. Check out that video, it’s really something. It feels wrong because of how fervently people close to Bieniemy attest to his acumen.

How about we listen to Patrick Mahomes, who said: “The type of man he is, the way he can control and be a leader of the locker room and the way that he coaches and schemes he brings to us. If he doesn’t [get a job], people are crazy.” Instead of searching for reasons, lean in on resounding endorsements of Coach Bieniemy from players that don’t even play for the Chefs. Listen to Coach Bieniemy’s comments after last year’s Super Bowl win. Listen to NFL titans like Andy Reid, who swear by Bieniemy. They’ll tell you the same thing: a man who would be a good head coach has not received an opportunity.

I’m confident his call will come sooner rather than later, though. How could it not?