Jon Gruden, The Football Version Of Larry Brown
By Spike Eskin
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) – Jay Gruden may not be the only Gruden interested in the Eagles head coaching position.
Former Eagles quarterback and current ESPN analyst Ron Jaworski suggested that Jon Gruden is interested in being a coach once again, and the Eagles job would be of interest to him.
"I think it would be something worth researching," Michael Lombardi told Angelo Cataldi and the 94WIP Morning Show on Tuesday. "I don't have the answer off the top of my head. I think it's something that needs to be examined, and I think based on that, it would then move forward and then it would be interesting to see how he interacts with dynamics of the front office."
Those dynamics will include general manager Howie Roseman, who was given a big vote of confidence from Jeffrey Lurie last week at the press conference announcing the firing of Andy Reid.
"I often call Jon [Gruden] Larry Brown, and I say this in a complimentary way about Jon. Jon is a coach, that I know how he is on television, in terms of he loves all the players and they're great, but when he is in the room with you there's really not a lot of players he likes," Lombardi said. "He's constantly motivating himself, which is a really good thing, this is a strength not a weakness, in terms of the players around him and what he has. He can be very demanding on the general manager and if he doesn't have a really strong general manege, I think he will change the roster constantly and I think you have to prepare yourself for that."
As well as being head coach of the Raiders and the Bucs, Jon Gruden was offensive coordinator for the Eagles from 1995 until 1997.
"Jon [Gruden] when he was here [in Philadelphia] was certainly productive with the offense, in terms of what he had at quarterback when you look back at those teams whether it was Ty Detmer, Rodney Pete, and then of course you had Charlie Garner, Ricky Watters in the backfield with Irvin Fryar," Lomardi said. "It was an interesting team and they made a playoff run. I think it would all depend on Jeff's [Lurie] relationship with Jon [Gruden] and how that ended, and how they felt that they were moving forward. I'm not sure about that at all."
