Despite the top executives of his team advising him against it, Colts owner Jim Irsay made the shocking choice to hire former Pro Bowl center Jeff Saturday as the team’s interim head coach.
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To replace fired Frank Reich, Indianapolis hired Saturday, a longtime former Colts center who has no experience coaching above the high school level. Jeff, a member of the Colts’ ring of honor and Super Bowl XLI-winning team, had previously worked as an ESPN TV analyst.
Irsay has fiercely defended his choice. Despite the fact that Colts assistant coaches Gus Bradley and John Fox have both held head coaching positions, he claimed there was “no other candidate” for the position.
Irsay said, “I’m glad he doesn’t have any NFL experience. Because it’s challenging for all of our coaches, I’m glad he hasn’t picked up the fear that permeates this league. They are scared. When they use analytics, things become challenging.”
Jeff Saturday talks about his first week as a coach on The Pat McAfee Show
Bill Cowher, a Hall of Fame coach, referred to Jeff’s hiring as “a disgrace to the coaching profession” because Jeff had no prior coaching experience. All NFL analysts agreed that this was a poor decision. However, Jeff’s team defeated the Raiders in the game to disprove everyone.
Following his victory, Jeff made an appearance on the Pat McAfee Show to talk about his first week. Pat greeted him by taking a sly dig at his critics.
He called Jeff a despicable and disgusting man who absolutely didn’t deserve the head coach’s job but still managed to guide his team to a win. Of course, Jeff loved the intro and even asked McAfee to accompany him wherever he goes before quickly realizing that he can’t afford him.
Talking about his coaching strategy, Jeff stated, “I made some minor tweaks and generally modified the practice schedules I trained to keep things in line.” He also added that he had to make a lot of quick decisions but thankfully, they panned out well.
He also spoke about his hiring, noting that while he had seen many basketball analysts frequently serve as head coaches of different teams, this was the first time in NFL history that a team hired an analyst to be their head coach.
Perhaps most importantly on an individual level, Saturday restored passion in the team. Most importantly, he has started off with a win which matter the most.
