Arguably, the biggest shock of the 2025 season was the Indianapolis Colts turning to 44-year-old Philip Rivers, who hadn’t taken a snap in five years, when they were short on QBs. He went 0-3, but for a guy who was on his couch in September, it was extremely impressive.
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Obviously, this guy’s love for the game has not waned even a smidge since his first retirement in 2020. And it doesn’t look like he’s quite ready to leave the NFL again just yet. For the past five years, Rivers has been the head coach at St. Michael Catholic in Alabama. It’s high school, but it’s still coaching.
Now, with that three-game stint confirming he is finally done with playing in the NFL for good, Rivers wants to move into coaching in the NFL. He even got himself a serious sit-down interview with the Buffalo Bills for their HC opening. Some are skeptical of Rivers in this spot, but Ryan Clark loves the idea.
“I like Philip Rivers as the head coach of the Buffalo Bills, I’d actually love it,” Clark said. “If you’re not gonna move right to Joe Brady, I’d rather you go Philip Rivers and step totally away from these recycled, failed-up head coaches … and step into something new.”
“I would like Philip Rivers as the head coach of the Buffalo Bills, I’d actually love it.” – Ryan Clark pic.twitter.com/Sf3INcCcPY
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) January 23, 2026
Clark is shrewd in pointing out the old boys club that the NFL still has to a degree. Once you get a head coaching job, you’re always going to be in the circuit thereafter, no matter how bad you were.
Clark brought up John Harbaugh, who had never been anything more than a special teams coach before the Ravens hired him in 2008, as an example of a coach with a fresh perspective who had a lot of success. He didn’t have any experience, but he could delegate, lead, and communicate. Clark believes Rivers “gets it”.
“What Philip Rivers showed us when he stepped onto the field with the Colts is, ‘I get it! I understand it! I can figure it out! If I wasn’t basically throwing the football with my left hand, we would have won football games, because I understood how to diagnose defense,'” Clark said.
As Clark went on to point out, it’s not just about Rivers. Obviously, as a first-time NFL head coach, he would need to bring in a strong contingent of support staff. That’s what NFL insider Daniel Jeremiah believes as well.
“My 2 thoughts on Rivers as HC. 1) He was basically the OC for at least a decade of his career,” Jeremiah wrote on Twitter. “2) He has a presence & is a natural leader. He needs to surround himself with an outstanding staff. When you play as long as he did, I’m sure he knows what to look for in that area.”
Apart from Rivers, the top candidates for the Bills’ head coaching job seem to be incumbent OC Joe Brady and Brian Daboll, who had a rough tenure as the New York Giants’ head coach but were really good as Buffalo’s OC from 2018-2021.
