Colts, Irsay Ripped on Good Morning Football
Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay made the surprising decision to name his former player Jeff Saturday the interim coach after dismissing Frank Reich on Monday.
Saturday takes the reins of the Colts (no pun intended) without having previous coaching experience in the NFL. Irsay considers that a strength of Saturday's.
Former All-Pro offensive lineman Joe Thomas considers it one of the most disrespectful things he's seen in the NFL.
"When you hire your drinking buddy to be the head coach of an NFL football team, it is one of the most disrespectful things I've ever seen in my entire life to the commitment, the lifestyle, and the experience that it takes to be an NFL coach... any coach... much less the head coach of the Indianapolis football Colts," said Thomas on Good Morning Football.
"You have got to be kidding me that this is something Jim Irsay and Jeff Saturday, who's not blameless for accepting the job, could have talked and decided this was the best thing for the Indianapolis Colts at this juncture of the season."
Thomas went on to describe his experience of living next door to Rob Chudzinski who was the head coach of the Cleveland Browns in 2013. He detailed the time commitment it took to be a head coach in the NFL. Chudzinski would see his kids just once or twice a week for a few hours at a time in season.
"That's a lifestyle," said Thomas. "That's who you are. That's not something you can just... show up for. This is something that changes your life when you decide to be a coach."
"It's one of the reasons I don't want to coach, because I want to see my children. I want to have a life outside of football."
"It's a different lifestyle, because it's who you are. So the disrespect that NFL coaches have to feel when they saw that this hire was made is higher than almost anything I can ever possibly remember in the NFL."
Thomas got even more animated after listening to Irsay double down on Saturday's lack of experience.
"And then to defend the decision by saying 'I'm happy that he doesn't have any experience, because he's not scared,'" said an exasperated Thomas. "If you didn't already insult every person that's worked their entire life to be a head coach in the NFL, then to go up there and say you 'like that he has no experience because all y'all NFL coaches are scared.'"
"When I saw this, I thought it was a joke."
"It was the most egregious thing I can ever remember happening in the NFL. And I went 1-31 my last two years in the NFL."
Irsay's hire of Saturday was a low-risk move in the short-term for a team that has lost three in a row. The only way to quiet the criticism is to win games.
The Colts have their first chance on Sunday against Josh McDaniels and the Las Vegas Raiders. Should the Colts lose and look bad doing it, the media frenzy will only get more fierce.
