© Mark J. Rebilas | 2020 Feb 2
Add Adam Schefter to the list of people who believe Robert Saleh is going to be an NFL coach very soon.
The 49ers defensive coordinator already interviewed with the Falcons, meets with the Lions today and has additional meetings scheduled with the Jaguars, Chargers and Jets for their vacant head coaching positions.
According to Schefter, he’s going to land one of those.
“I think he’s going to get a job,” Schefter told Murph & Mac on Thursday. “Maybe it won’t be this cycle, I think it will, but even if he doesn’t get one now, it will certainly be here in the near future.”
The one thing working against Saleh, at least in the minds of some folks like ProFootballTalk’s Mike Florio, is that there is more interest on the open market for an offensive-minded head coach. Whether that’s true remains to be seen, but Schefter pointed out that if you look around the league, most of the successful head coaches are defensive guys.
“I think teams have been drawn to offensive-minded head coaches. Offense sells tickets, it’s sexy, it’s what people like, it’s where it’s at. If you go back and look at it, six of the eight longest tenured coaches in the NFL today — Ron Rivera, Mike Tomlin, Pete Carroll, Bill Belichick, Mike Zimmer, John Harbaugh — are defensive guys. That doesn’t include Sean McDermott, Mike Vrabel and Brian Flores.
“Even though teams have been drawn to offense, the most successful coaches today have a defensive background.”
Listen to the full interview below.