Is Falcons’ coaching search ‘Belichick or bust’? Maybe not as we enter Week 3

Monday was the first day NFL teams could conduct in-person interviews with head coaching candidates who are employed by teams whose season has ended. That means the Atlanta Falcons’ coaching search could end any day now.

But it probably won’t.

Atlanta fans need to prepare themselves to end this week without a head coach and to add new names to the “has interviewed” list between now and then. For instance, former Tennessee Titans coach Mike Vrabel is expected to interview for the job this week, according to a team source.

Vrabel would become the 14th person known to have interviewed for the job. Team owner Arthur Blank announced Jan. 8 that his search for a new head coach would be exhaustive, but this has been borderline exhausting.

The Falcons seemingly announce a new interview every day, sometimes twice a day — like Sunday, when Houston Texans offensive coordinator Bobby Slowik and Detroit Lions offensive coordinator Ben Johnson participated in virtual interviews.

It is worth asking how serious some of these virtual interviews are. Johnson’s team finished its playoff game Sunday around 6 p.m. and plays in the NFC Championship Game this weekend. Chances are his head wasn’t 100 percent on Atlanta’s 2024 salary-cap situation Sunday night.

Still, the Falcons get credit for checking all the boxes the NFL has sketched out. The league first introduced the Rooney Rule (named after Dan Rooney, the late owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers) in 2003 to increase the number of minority head coaches in the league and has added to its regulations regularly since then.

The result is a much slower head coach hiring cycle that gives more coaches opportunities to at least be exposed to the interview process. The Falcons thus far have interviewed six minority candidates: San Francisco 49ers defensive coordinator Steve Wilks, Carolina Panthers defensive coordinator Ejiro Evero, Baltimore Ravens assistant head coach Anthony Weaver, Philadelphia Eagles offensive coordinator Brian Johnson, Detroit defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn and Los Angeles Rams defensive coordinator Raheem Morris.

All of those interviews have been virtual, although ESPN reported Monday that Atlanta will have a second interview this week with Morris. The Falcons must conduct at least two in-person interviews with minority candidates to comply with the Rooney Rule. Once that is done, they can hire a coach whenever they want.

Which brings us to Bill Belichick. The former New England Patriots head coach has met with the Falcons twice, most recently Friday in a meeting that included Blank, team CEO Rich McKay, team president Greg Beadles and general manager Terry Fontenot, according to a team source.

Belichick is the only candidate known to have interviewed twice for the position and to have met with the entire administrative team. That — combined with Belichick’s six Super Bowl rings as a head coach, the fact he isn’t known to have interviewed with any other teams, Blank’s former pursuits of big-name head coaches like Joe Gibbs and Bill Parcells and the fact that Atlanta released defensive coordinator Ryan Nielsen to interview for another job the day after its first meeting with Belichick — has led to the belief that the Falcons’ interview process is simply about wading through all the NFL’s bureaucracy on the way to an inevitable conclusion.

Maybe. Maybe not. At the very least, the Belichick candidacy has lost momentum in the past week, with multiple league sources telling The Athletic that assuming it’s “Belichick or bust” is inaccurate. In addition to Slowik, Johnson, Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh and the six minority candidates, the Falcons have met with Ravens defensive coordinator Mike Macdonald, Cincinnati Bengals offensive coordinator Brian Callahan and Buffalo Bills interim offensive coordinator Joe Brady. Callahan was set for a second interview this week, but the Tennessee Titans reportedly hired him as head coach on Monday night.

More interviews (and maybe even more names) will be announced as the week goes on. So it’s going to be a busy and ultimately unsatisfying week for Falcons fans who are following this search closely.

And it might not even be over next week. The Falcons apparently were impressed with the Ravens’ Macdonald and Weaver and the Lions’ Johnson and Glenn, and they have requested second interviews with Macdonald and Weaver, according to NFL Network. If any of that affinity turns into an actual job, that announcement wouldn’t be made until after the Super Bowl if that coach’s team advances past the conference championship games.

So it looks like more waiting for Atlanta fans who are becoming all too comfortable with it.

(Top photo of Falcons owner Arthur Blank: Jamie Sabau / USA Today)