Potential Head Coaches

[ladypanther]

True his brother has been extremely successful. However John spent 10 years coaching for the Philadelphia Eagles before getting the HC job in Baltimore.

Jim has had other valuable experience....an NFL QB, an NFL coach, successful HC at 2 programs. I think he is our guy.

[Delhommey]

Underrated right now...

Zimmer

Shelmon

[Catdaddy]

Stanford had only one way to go and that was up. Sound familiar? Like when we signed John Fox and he was the next best think since 3 piece bikinis

[Mr. Scot]

Underrated right now...

Zimmer

Shelmon

Zimmer's my next profile (ironically enough, I think that's the pic I have for him too).

Everything I've read about Harbaugh's personality - sideline antics, confrontations, etc - makes me think he'd be a lot more fun for the beat writers to cover than Fox has been.

(whether or not that's a good thing is a matter of perspective, I suppose)

[Catdaddy]

Harbaugh has pulled Stanford out of the dumpster in 4 years and has brought them to elite status.

I simply can't see Jerry Richardson pulling the trigger on this kind of hire however.

This is Al Davis Jon Gruden/Lane Kiffin type material here.

Although Gruden had so much more Pro coaching experience. Harbaugh is virtuall bare in this category.

His best record was 8-5 last season, you call that elite? The Pac 10 was as weak as it ever has been last season. Stanford was rock bottom when he got there and could only improve. If you going by that we need to hire Tyrone Willingham, he had many better seasons at Stanford than Harbaugh did last season

[Delhommey]

Everything I've read about Harbaugh's personality 9sideline antics, confrontations, etc) makes me think he'd be a lot more fun for the beat writers to cover than Fox has been.

(whether or not that's a good thing is a matter of perspective, I suppose)

As the ancient Chinese curse goes: May you live in interesting times...

[Mr. Scot]

MIKE ZIMMER

...

CURRENT JOB: Defensive Coordinator, Cincinnati Bengals

HISTORY: Bengals DC (2008-present) Falcons DC (2007) Cowboys DC (2000-2006) Cowboys Defensive Assistant, DB Coach (1994-1999) fourteen years college coaching experience, mostly as a DC

DOB: 06/05/56 (54)

STRENGTHS: History of success at the pro level. Defenses have consistently performed at a high level. Was a constant in Dallas even when the head coaching position was a revolving door. Worked under, and was highly regarded by, legendary coach Bill Parcells. Coached both 4-3 and 3-4 schemes in Dallas. Even though Parcells tenure was his first time ever running a 3-4, Zimmer coached it well.

QUESTIONS: Perennial bridesmaid. Has been talked about as a head coaching candidate since his days in Dallas but from what I can find, has never actually netted an interview.

PANTHER CONNECTIONS: Coaches alongside former Panther assistants Chip Morton (strength and conditioning, 1995-1998) and Darrin Simmons (special teams assistant, 1999-2002) Coached against the Panthers for one season as part of Bobby Petrino’s staff in Atlanta. Panthers and Falcons split that year (so did Petrino).

WHO HE MIGHT BRING WITH HIM: Ken Zampese, current Bengals QB coach and a candidate for the Panthers OC job that eventually went to Jeff Davidson. Current Bengal OC Bob Bratkowski is also a possibility since Zimmer and Bratkowski are close friends. A really wild scenario could see Zimmer getting Jason Garrett as an OC if Garrett were to depart Dallas (Zimmer coached for several years while Garrett was a player) but that's highly unlikely. Garrett as a head coach with Zimmer as his OC is only slightly less out there.

WHY WE MIGHT NOT GET HIM: If Marvin Lewis isn't retained (he's a lame duck like Fox) then he could get an offer for the Bengals job. Also, like Frazier, he could be a hot commodity.

ODDS AND ENDS: Third oldest on the current list of candidates (Heimerdinger is the oldest, Keith Butler is second by only a month). No pro playing experience. Unusual college career at Illinois State in that he started off as a quarterback but later moved to linebacker. Wife Vikki died tragically last year. Players rallied around him after. Vikki was said to have sometimes baked cookies and brownies for players whom Zimmer had ripped in practice the day before.

ANALYSIS: Zimmer’s was my top candidate for a longtime, but more recently I've jumped on the Jim Harbaugh bandwagon. I’ve admitted all along that there are questions about him as there are with anyone. It’s fair to wonder, with his record, why he might not have been interviewed for a head coaching position before. Does he want to be a head coach? You’d think so, but who knows?

Regardless, time spent in the Bengals organization has hurt his rep a lot (kind of like it does with everybody who goes there). Mike Brown is like the anti-Midas. Everything he touches turns to crap. Zimmer's still a good guy in my opinion, and my hope right now is that he has the chance to rehab his career somewhere else. Not likely it'll be in Charlotte, though.

READ UP: Bengals Coaching Bio

WATCH: NFL All Access: Mike Zimmer

UPDATE (11/8): Any scenarios involving Jason Garrett are pretty well off the table now that Garrett's been named Head Coach of the Cowboys.

[Dpantherman]

Heres a video of Zimmer in action!

http://www.nfl.com/videos/nfl-network-total-access/09000d5d819050a0/All-access-Mike-Zimmer

found another

http://www.nfl.com/videos/nfl-films-sound-efx/09000d5d81561133

[Dpantherman]

the second video is the best--I fugging LOVE his intensity. and he doesn't chew gum!

[scpanther22]

I still think Zimmer may be to old...he is 54.I think we would go younger than that.

[Mr. Scot]

That's probably all I'm gonna do for tonight. Will try to do more in the days (and weeks) ahead.

Some of the other guys I plan on checking out are listed in the initial post. It's not necessarily the full list though. I'm open to other suggestions.

Undecided whether I'm going to be profiling the retreads. I might, but I really don't think the Panthers will go that route, and their names and records are already fairly well known.

[Mr. Scot]

A little further insight from ESPN: Mike Zimmer finds solace in coaching

Excerpts...

It is Tuesday, hours before another training camp starts in Georgetown, Ky., 10 months removed from the day Zimmer left work to check on his wife, Vikki, and found her dead. And nothing is really the same. He subsists mainly on microwaved frozen meals, still refers to just about everything with a "we" and constantly texts, dotes on and worries about his daughters.

He knows it doesn't make sense that a man surrounded by 81 football players could feel alone. That he can drop F-bombs over the span of a two-hour practice but still cry over a random memory. That he can be so jangled up inside that he'll go to church, three times a week sometimes, and light candles and ask existential questions. But that's what the quiet does to you.

Sure, she would go to the games, even when times were bad and Zimmer told her to stay home so she wouldn't be subjected to the fans' surly comments. Thing is, they were rarely bad with Zim. He helped engineer some of the best defenses in the NFL in Dallas, winning a Super Bowl with Barry Switzer, then thriving under Bill Parcells.

When criticism came down from the stands, within earshot of Vikki, she occasionally would fire back with a, "You don't know how hard they work!" She was always the compassionate one, everybody's mother. She shuddered at the four-letter words Zim would rain on his players and told him he needed to be nicer. She softened bruised egos with cookies and brownies.

It would make the old coach roll his eyes, the Post-it notes reminding him to bring in the treats, the trays he'd have to lug in some early mornings when all he wanted to do was break down film and build his guys back up.

When the Zimmers came to Cincinnati in 2008, they decided to lease a tidy, wood-floored condo, which sits a few miles from the stadium. His new job as the Bengals' defensive coordinator wasn't exactly rooted in stability. He inherited a group of castoffs and a defense that was consistently near the bottom of the NFL. Critics blasted owner Mike Brown for not opening his coffers to produce a team serious about winning; the people of Cincinnati had given up on the defense.

"When I first got here, the expectations of the defense in Cincinnati were … they were the worst thing ever," he says. "I felt sorry for them after hearing all the different things people were saying. So that was sort of our rallying cry."

His first year in Cincinnati, his defense finished a stunning 12th. His motivational tactics were the stuff that would turn a pack of marshmallows to steel. He gathered his team in a meeting room and pointed to the seventh-round draft picks, the washed-up veterans, the guys, he said, that nobody else wanted. He asked them to raise a hand if they ever had been cut from a team. Outstretched hands filled the room.

"If we don't start playing better," he told them, "you're going to be out on the street!"

Deep inside, Zimmer loved the fringe guys. Those are the men, he says, who know they can't slip up again. Those are the ones desperate enough to do anything to prove themselves because they know they have only this one last shot.

Tank Johnson was one of those guys last summer. The troubled tackle sat in Zimmer's office during camp, listening to the background report that was being whispered in league circles. Johnson was arrested multiple times in his younger days in Chicago, spent a suspension-shortened season in Dallas, then signed with the Bengals in the spring of 2009. This was seemingly it for the former second-round draft pick, and Johnson, perhaps, could feel it.

"He told me what the perception of me was in this league," Johnson says. "And a lot of times you don't get to hear that. He came right to me and told me, 'Hey, this is what's out there on you right now, and if you want to be successful in this league, you're going to have to clean A, B and C up.'

"He didn't leave any gray area. When a coach is straight with you, you can take it a lot better."

[Dpantherman]

Zimmer got me pumped on those Videos. Im ready to go out and play...btw that and those excerpts, im almost ready to change my avatar again

[Dpantherman]

Adam Schefter made a list of his own last year: http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/columns/story?columnist=schefter_adam&id=4704338