Things are going pretty great for the Buccaneers right now, as it looks like another season is about to wrap up with confirmation that the NFC South still runs through Tampa. The Bucs are a win away from clinching a fourth straight division title and punching a playoff ticket for the fifth season in a row, which is almost impossible to comprehend for anyone who lived through the dark age of the 2010s.
Baker Mayfield is playing on an MVP level, even if the Pro Bowl snubbed him, and the way the offense has played has Liam Coen as one of the hottest head coaching candidates on the market. He's being directly compared to Ben Johnson as a top offensive guru teams will try to hire this offseason, even though there's a growing chance he returns next year to run things back.
One place he won't be going is New Orleans, as the Saints head to Tampa Bay as zombies just trying to walk to the offseason. It's where the team will have a big decision to make on who the next head coach will be, and so far, everything that's been rumored is comedy gold for Bucs fans.
Saints are reportedly interested in hiring Matt Nagy or Mike McCarthy
According to The Athletic's Dianna Russini, two notable names have been added to the list of potential Saints head coaches. Kansas City's offensive coordinator Matt Nagy is high on the list, and so is Dallas Cowboys head coach Mike McCarthy.
The latter continues to get named in rumors despite the fact that he hasn't been fired -- nor does it seem like the Cowboys are going to let him go. All signs point toward Dallas running things back one more season before making a change, but having McCarthy do what he did in tanking the Cowboys for the Saints would be a gift for Bucs fans.
So, too, would be New Orleans hiring Nagy. There's an argument to be made that it wasn't totally Nagy's fault that things didn't work out in Chicago, as the franchise has shown everyone just what a colossal cluster it is this year. Then again, nobody has ever accused the Saints of being a well-run organization which means Nagy could be getting right back into a similar situation he was in with the Bears.
Despite what Saints fans might say, the team is nowhere near competing and is closer to a transitional period than anything else. Spencer Rattler is only a rookie but looks awful, the pieces that were great a few years ago are aging out of their prime, and the team operates its budget like a front for the mafia.
Nagy would come in and need to draft a quarterback and rebuild the offense -- something he screwed up twice in Chicago. He didn't draft Mitchell Trubisky but he also didn't develop him beyond the bare minimum and he failed with Justin Fields.
Of course, going back to Kansas City might have allowed him a chance to fix what he did wrong in Chicago but it's a risky second chance for the Saints to bet on. There will be plenty of dust kicked up by the rumor mill as the coaching cycle heats up, but so far everything seems to be working out in Tampa Bay's favor when it comes to retaining control of the division.
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