Ask Jim Owczarski

[jowczarski]

@BenZoo2 – from others in the media? Honestly, most are envious of our situations as beat guys. Mike Brown and the family, and Marvin, are old school, pro-media. Marvin firmly believes in letting his coordinators and position coaches speak to the media. He thinks it helps them. I can tell you most other teams wall off their coaches and coordinators, fearful of … who knows what.

Some are surprised the fan base hates Marvin and Andy so much. Seriously. Yes, the last two years have been bad, but they look at 2011 and on and see success not many other teams around the country experience. So they wonder about that at times.

As for the owner and coaching staff – there’s a heavy respect level for Marvin, for sure. I’m not sure there is an opinion about the Brown family. The older generation of writers know Mike a bit better from his days as a true talk-every-day GM but for the most part there’s, again, a respect level for keeping the continuity of the head coach and players, spending money (look it up) and retaining talent.

I’m sure that will be a little surprising to hear.

@Pally – Ha. No good coach? Marvin Lewis was a pretty good coach. So were all his coordinators and position coaches that came. Same with Sam Wyche. He was pretty good. I’ll debate on Forrest Gregg but he obviously worked here. Why is the “team situation” so lousy? What does that mean? I do agree that this job is very attractive. I did write that some candidates will not consider it because they will view themselves as having “better” options. What does that mean? It means that yes, this situation is unique. You will have a small-ish staff (but not the smallest; New England and Pittsburgh are a couple guys shorter). You will be expected to scout your future draft picks (But I had one coach tell me that ability and control alone is worth a million dollars of salary) and yes, you will have to talk to the owner of the team every day. But Mike loves football and he loves his team. I imagine there are worse things to have to do than talk to your boss before meetings. But, some may not like that. The Bengals are going to hire a coach they feel can get them back to the playoffs in 2018 and beyond. I really doubt that whoever it is, the majority of the fan base will celebrate and rally behind.

@BoomerFan – It is one of 32. That’s why Hue Jackson isn’t the head coach in waiting right now and why he jumped to Cleveland two years ago. These guys can’t help it. Yeah, maybe McDaniels is being picky. He can be. He’s been fired once already, he has no current job security issues. But MOST of these guys will jump at the chance to be head coach of this club.

@XenoMorph – Minter wasn’t as good as I thought he’d be, but hey, that happens. Maybe the Bengals saved themselves some money by him turning down a multi-year offer to gamble on himself. Really good dude. Great locker room guy. Honestly – bringing him back to back up in the middle is not a terrible idea if he fits what a new coach wants schematically.

@McC – a huge misconception. The Bengals, when not replacing a coach in-season due to a firing (Shula/Coslet) or a resignation (Coslet/LeBeau) have usually hired from the outside. Tiger Johnson was an internal promotion, but Bill Walsh would have been too. Homer Rice was an outside hire. Forrest Gregg was an outside hire. Sam Wyche was an outside hire. Marvin was an outside hire. Not sure why people think like this.

@ZWP – that has to be determined. His grievance is expected to be determined just before free agency in March. If he loses, he is an unrestricted free agent and yes, he’ll be traded. If he wins and is an unrestricted free agent, well, then he walks and the team will get a comp pick higher than the fifth round they drafted him in.