It’s a big week for the Los Angeles Rams, specifically for a few of their assistant coaches. Raheem Morris and Kevin O’Connell have drawn a lot of interest from other teams in their searches for a new head coach, landing interviews with several other organizations.
O’Connell has interviews with the Broncos on Thursday night and the Vikings on Friday, while the Texans are also setting up a meeting at some point soon. Morris is also interviewing with the Vikings on Friday, two days before the Rams face the Buccaneers in the divisional round of the playoffs.
Running backs coach Thomas Brown also lined up an interview with the Dolphins for their head coaching job, but it’s unclear when that is scheduled for.
They’re obviously focused on the task at hand, which is beating the defending Super Bowl champions, but they’ll also have an eye on the biggest interviews of their lives – and understandably so.
Sean McVay knows O’Connell and Morris be thinking about the interviews in addition to preparing for the Buccaneers, but he doesn’t expect it to take away from their focus on Tampa Bay.
“I really believe that I think you can do a great job of preparing yourself to go show well in these interviews, while also doing a great job being thorough with your preparation, getting your players ready to go, and your roles and responsibilities within the framework of kind of how we put together the game plan,” he said Wednesday. “What I think’s naive is, ‘Oh, I’m not going to think about it.’ Of course you’re going to think about it if you have this unique opportunity. And so, I think talking about some of the experiences I had – it’s even a little bit different now based on just the implementation of being able to meet with people on Zoom and things of that nature. So, I know I was so fortunate at an early age to be able to get an opportunity to compete for these roles and what a hypocrite I would be if didn’t try to say, ‘Hey, listen, go compete to the best of your ability. If that’s a goal that you have, go shoot your shot and make sure that, hey, if I can help in any form or fashion, I’m happy to do that.’”
McVay has always been happy to see his coordinators and assistant coaches get opportunities elsewhere, and there have been plenty of them to leave the Rams for other jobs. Zac Taylor, Matt LaFleur and Brandon Staley all went on to land head coaching jobs after working on McVay’s staff, and O’Connell and Morris could be next in line – as could Brown.
Having been through this process before with coaches interviewing during the playoffs, McVay doesn’t expect it to affect this postseason run.
“They also know what their roles are given the week and what we have at stake,” he continued. “And so, when I went through this with different coaches before, I didn’t think it in the least bit took away from Zac Taylor’s ability to prepare going into his Super Bowl when he kind of knew he was going to become the Bengals’ head coach. Staley was getting opportunities before last year and did a great job of kind of keeping his focus while also, hey, being able to go show well when you get a chance to talk to teams. I think it’s a great opportunity for those guys and I’m not worried about it taking away from our focus on the Bucs.”
