Ahead of the NFL Coaching Craziness, There’s 1 Name to Monitor for a MIN Add
After the regular season ends, the NFL coaching massacre takes place (colloquially known at Black Monday).
If one team opts to move in a new direction — the Atlanta Falcons — then monitoring the status of Raheem Morris makes a pile of sense. The coach hasn’t had a great stint as the top leader in Atlanta, but he’s a very good coach. Even more fascinating is that he overlapped with Kevin O’Connell in LA during that Super Bowl effort, making it easy to connect the purple dots.
The NFL Coaching Madness and A Possible Opening in MIN
Quite possibly, Brian Flores is going to step away (which is to say nothing of players getting close to the end of their time in Minnesota).
The rumors are swirling around the excellent defensive coordinator. And, to be sure, there’s good reason. For a little while, the Vikings have known that a new deal needs to get sorted out for the DC, but that hasn’t yet occurred. Best guess is that he remains, though that remains to be determined.
Even if Coach Flores stays — that’s the preferred outcome by a Minnesota mile — Raheem Morris has some serious appeal.
The Falcons do not have a formidable defense. The 6-9 team has the NFL’s 20th-ranked defense due to allowing an average of 24.0 points against per game. Last year, Atlanta was even worse, finishing off the season with the NFL’s 23rd defense due to allowing 24.9 points against per game.
Deciding to double dip at quarterback — signing Kirk Cousins to huge money alongside sinking the No. 8 selection in Michael Penix Jr. in the 2024 NFL Draft — has been the single worst strategy for the Falcons. Watching Seinfeld and seeing George Costanza get corrected (“just take one dip and end it!”) would have done Atlanta well.
In the end, the Falcons could opt for a new direction. Doing so could lead to moving on from Mr. Morris.
The coach is well respected even if his chances as a head coach haven’t gone particularly well. From 2009-2011, Morris was the leading coach in Tampa. He then had a shot in Atlanta in 2020 before the current effort from 2024-2025. The win/loss record sits at an uninspiring 35/56, which means possessing a .385 winning percentage. For context, Kevin O’Connell finds himself at a 42/25 record, good for a .627 percentage.
So, Raheem Morris may be better equipped to be a coordinator instead of a head coach. Sometimes that happens.
There’s Josh McDaniels over in New England. He has been awful while sitting in the top chair while often being brilliant as the Patriots’ OC.
Over in Kansas City, Steve Spagnuolo is arguably the league’s foremost defensive coordinator. Note that his record as a head coach shows 11 wins up against 41 losses. The .212 winning percentage is incredibly ugly, frighteningly close to Les Steckel of the 1984 Vikings (.188 percentage). Spagnuolo knows how to coach; the man just needs to be slotted into the correct role.
In other words, the potential to sign Raheem Morris should have some appeal. His defense was good enough to help the Rams earn a Lombardi by corralling Joe Burrow’s Bengals to just 20 points. Lots of credit goes to Aaron Donald, but the game got sealed when Burrow was sacked while trying to surmount the deficit.
Pretty soon, the Vikings are going to need to confront a shortage of financial flexibility. The incoming talent will need to arrive alongside modest contracts. Such is life in an NFL with a salary cap and a Vikings team with well-paid players aplenty.
Somewhere where there isn’t a salary cap is within the coaching staff. Minnesota can spend freely to onboard high-end talent in this area of football without there being any repercussions.
The NFL coaching craziness is soon to grow zany. If Coach Morris gets shown the door, the Vikings should pickup the phone to seek out a potential relationship.
