Eric Bieniemy, the Rooney Rule, and His Future as a Head Coach

Eric Bieniemy, the Rooney Rule, and His Future as a Head Coach – Eric Bieniemy is going to be a Head Coach in the NFL one day. That may come as soon at 2021. In the meantime, he has become a touchstone for those seeking to better understand any changes the league may be making concerning the Rooney Rule as it applies to minorities taking leadership roles for teams in the league.

What Has Been the Rooney Rule?

The Rooney Rule has been the NFL’s policy requiring teams to interview ethnic-minority candidates for any head coaching and/or senior football operation positions. It’s the NFL’s version of affirmative action, but has had no hiring quota… just an interviewing quota. So, it seems it has been an affirmative action policy with no teeth. Also, teams could block their assistants from interviewing if they wanted making nit it even harder for some applicants to move up the ladder is they wanted to. In other words: this Rooney Rule has not only been a policy with no real power, but it has had a glass ceiling as well.

The New Ruling

Teams can no longer block their assistants from going for an interview if they want a coordinator job with another team or if they want a front office job as an assistant or even a General Manager position.

The NFL will also require that teams interview:

• at least 2 external minority candidates for head coaching jobs,
• at least one minority candidate for any of the 3 coordinator positions and,
• at least one external minority candidate for the senior football operations or G.M. job.

Tabled But Not Gone Away

Earlier this week the owners were also considering a change to the Rooney Rule that would give teams draft-pick “enhancements” if they hired minority coaches or minority General Managers. I will go on record as saying that’s a bad idea and I agree with Hall of Fame coach Tony Dungy on this one when he says,

“… we’ve got to do something drastic. In my mind, this is drastic, but I don’t personally think it’s the right thing to do. But, I think it should spur some consideration and communication and conversation and people say, okay, this might not be it… but maybe we can do… that. I’ve just never been in favor of, rewarding people for doing the right thing.”

Eric Beiniemy and His Future

It’s hard to see how Eric Bieniemy didn’t get one of the Head Coaching positions this offseason. Washington, Dallas, Carolina, New York (Giants), and Cleveland all have new HCs and Bieniemy could have been a good fit for several of those jobs. “A good fit.” Hmm… that may be the problem. What a team’s owner and or management thinks is a good fit in today’s NFL, may not what would have been a good fit even ten years ago.

In 2018, the Chiefs ran the ball 39.4% of the time while passing it 60.6%. In 2019, again it was about a 60% pass to 40% run ratio. Both of those seasons, Eric Bieniemy was the OC. In 2017, the year before Bieniemy came along, the Chiefs ran the ball 42.72% of the time. Not a big difference you say? We’ll Bieniemy was a RB in prior to coaching them became a RB coach before taking over as OC. He has a RB background right? So, why the increase in passing percentage when he moved up to OC?

That may be the wrong question.

Only three teams had a running percentage over 50% in 2019… the Ravens at 57.5% of course with their run-happy QB, the San Francisco 49ers at 51% with a triad of RBs plus a coach stuck in his father’s shadow (Kyle Shanahan – Mike Shanahan), and then the Minnesota Vikings at 50.5% with Dalvin Cook leading the way. Not even the Tennessee Titans with Derrick Henry (the league’s leading rusher) in the house, were running the ball 50% of the time last year. They were at 49.8%.

It’s now solidly a passing league and the recent trend should back that idea up (I went back to 2011 and only five teams ran the ball more than 50% of the time that year… so it was some time prior to that date that teams who ran the ball did so more than team’s who passed it). What that means for Eric Bieniemy is that most teams are looking for a HC who has had ties to a QB or who could nurture a QB along and make him into a star. What Bieniemy has brought with him, is a hard nosed approach. Travis Kelce has said of Bieniemy:

“Coach Bieniemy brings a fierce, aggressive mentality to the offense. Kind of a gritty, punch-you-in-the-mouth-type of mindset, and I think that has rubbed off on everybody, from Pat [Mahomes] throwing the ball aggressively downfield. The play calling is a little bit more aggressive and, sure enough, everybody getting the ball has been a north runner.”

There is a better reason for teams to want to hire Eric Bieniemy: Love. His players love him. In fact, Fullback Anthony Sherman says of Bieniemy, “I love him—he’s the best coach that I’ve ever been around.“

High praise. Sherman isn’t one to throw flowery words at the moon. Enjoy Eric Bieniemy this season in K.C. guys. It’s likely his last.

Laddie Morse — ArrowheadOne

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