Articles

Getting On Board with Pat Shurmur

by Michael J. Basile @mdoubleJB

Throughout the Giants search, ‘sexy’ names came up and excited the fan base.  Bill Belichick and Nick Saban, were both long shots to begin with.  The others are all unproven, and other than Josh McDaniels, there were no TRUE favorites at first.  The more you look at it, Pat Shurmur, the current Offensive Coordinator for the Vikings has the potential to be exactly what the Giants need to take them through this transition period, and to another run of sustained success.

Some people might not like Shurmur due to his previous Head Coaching experience.  He is a once failed head coach; HOWEVER, it was with the Browns.   No one succeeds in Cleveland.  The bigger story is that there have been some notable coaches to reach the pinnacle AFTER failing as a first time head coach:  Belichick, Tom Coughlin, Gary Kubiak, Pete Carroll, Tony Dungy, Jon Gruden, Mike Shanahan, etc.

Not to compare Shurmur to those guys, but there are a handful of coaches who failed and went on to be legendary coaches.  Just because you don’t win a Super Bowl with your first team as head coach, doesn’t mean that you’ll never get there.

Shurmur also coached under Andy Reid, a brilliant offensive mind (Hopefully Shurmur also learned from Andy’s poor in-game management).  Let’s face it, Quarterbacks are Shurmurs thing.  He helped develop Donovan Mcnabb, Nick Foles, and now Case Keenum.  Let’s not forget that Keenum is having a career year.  He is the perfect candidate to transition from Eli to Webb or the potential 2nd overall pick.  If it’s a Quarterback of course.

At the end of the day, there is no telling if a guy is going to be a great head coach or not; But despite this not being a ‘sexy’ pick, it could be one that leads the franchise back to the big game.