IS TAKING DOC TO SEE THE DOC
St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist Bryan Burwell sat down with fired Rams coach Steve Spagnuolo Friday, mostly to talk about what happened to end his three-year tenure in St. Louis, but also about Spagnuolo's future.
Spagnuolo told Burwell there had been exploratory conversations with NFL teams, but that no one has offered him a job. He told Burwell he was leaving Saturday for a four-day break with his wife, Maria, who is from Philadelphia, to think things over and prepare to move forward.
He did not confirm or deny he had been in contact with the Eagles, who are evaluating the fate of defensive coordinator Juan Castillo. Spagnuolo was an Eagles defensive assistant from 1999-2006.
"In all honesty, I don't know," he said. "I was let go on Monday, and today's Friday and I am very blessed in this way. The phone has been ringing. There has been contact (from several teams), but I have asked that everyone respect the fact that I need some time to figure out what I want to do next, and so far, everyone has."
Asked how much time he needs to figure out what he wants to do next, Spagnuolo said: "I don't know. I'm not sure."
Spagnuolo mentioned that he might take a year off and spend it with Maria. She laughed off that notion.
"I know Steve, and I told him no way," she said, laughing. "There's no way he will be able to sit around for a year doing nothing. … He loves coaching way too much to sit around idly for a year."
"There are two extremes for what I'd ultimately like to do, and a lot of possibilities in between," he said. "The extremes are 1) sitting out a year, or 2) getting another head coaching job. One is realistic, the other probably isn't very realistic. No one has asked me to be a head coach yet and I'm not saying that is going to happen. But everything in between — like being a coordinator again, or maybe a position coach — yeah, those are both realistic possibilities. Would I think about a college job? No. I love this league too much."
Here is a link to Burwell's column.
So, if the Eagles are going to continue their defensive reordering, which began with the Saturday dismissal of secondary coach Johnny Lynn, it would seem they will not be able to hire Spagnuolo at least until mid- to late week.
It'll be interesting to see if the Giants have a defensive coordinator opening by then, should they lose today to Atlanta. Spagnuolo was their defensive coordinator four years ago, when they beat the unbeaten Patriots in the Super Bowl.
Les
Bowen has covered the Eagles for the Daily News
since 2002.
Before that, he spent nearly 13 years covering the Flyers. It took Les
only a few seasons after the switch to figure out that there was no
penalty box at the Linc, and that the time really wasn't his, despite
what Andy Reid kept saying. Les came to Philadelphia and the Daily News
from Charlotte in 1983. In the intervening years, he has pretty much
lost track of NASCAR, and his accent. He, his wife Barbara, and their
two sons live in Haddon Township, New Jersey.
E-mail Les at bowenl@phillynews.com
and follow
him on Twitter.
Paul
Domowitch has been with the Daily News since 1982.
He has spent most of his nearly 3 decades with the paper covering the
Eagles and pro football. For the last 10 years, he’s been a
selector for the Pro Football Hall of Fame. A native of Wilkes-Barre
and a graduate of Wilkes University, Domo started his career in Texas,
working first for the Midland Reporter-Telegram (1976-78), and then for
the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, where he covered some god-awful Texas
Ranger baseball teams. His first beat at the Daily News actually was
boxing, which he covered just long enough to lose 2 sports coats to
blood spatter before moving on to football. Domo and his wife Shelley,
a University of Oklahoma grad who still hasn’t gotten over
that Fiesta Bowl loss to Boise State 5 years ago, have 2 terrific
daughters -- Allison, 28, who is an attorney in South Jersey, and Amy,
25, who works in administration for a professional baseball team.
E-mail Domo at PDomo@aol.com and follow
him on Twitter.
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