The Monday Night Football booth may see more turnover. Three of the teams that fired their GMs this season are interested in Louis Riddick, a former NFL front office executive-turned-TV analyst.
Ahead of his meeting with the Lions, Riddick is interviewing with the Texans, Adam Schefter and Chris Mortensen of ESPN.com report (on Twitter). The Texans are interviewing Riddick on Wednesday, while the Lions are scheduled to do so Friday.
The Jaguars have also expressed interest, Schefter adds (on Twitter), but have yet to schedule a meeting. The Jags fired Dave Caldwell a day after the Lions axed Bob Quinn. Both teams appear set to construct rebuilds, and one of the projects could mean ESPN again changing up its Monday-night booth.
A former NFL defensive back, Riddick worked as the Eagles’ director of player personnel from 2010-13. He spent nine years with Philadelphia. Before that, he broke into the scouting world with Washington from 2001-04. Riddick has been with ESPN for several years and joined Brian Griese and Steve Levy in the network’s latest reprise of its Monday Night Football team this season.
The Texans are using a search firm headlined by ex-coaches-turned-analysts Tony Dungy and Jimmy Johnson. They are moving on from a tumultuous GM period, with coach-GM Bill O’Brien making several splashy and scrutinized moves during his year and change in power. The Texans and 12-year GM Rick Smith parted ways after the 2017 season, and Houston employed Brian Gaine for barely a year before giving O’Brien personnel power. As a result, the Texans do not have a bevy of cornerstone players under contract beyond Deshaun Watson and J.J. Watt. The latter may well be traded next year.
Jacksonville shifted front office structures during Caldwell’s tenure, using Tom Coughlin as its top decision-maker from 2017-19, but kept the former employed for nearly eight seasons. During that time, seven double-digit loss campaigns sandwiched the Jags’ outlier 2017 AFC championship game run. The next Jags GM is projected to inherit the NFL’s most cap space in 2021, and he will have two first-round picks — the first of those likely coming at No. 1 or No. 2 overall — to use to construct a rebuild.
3 teams on the Louis Riddick train. This might be the year we get to see him put his money where his mouth is. I have a pretty good feeling he won’t be in the Monday night booth next season.
Would be good to have him and Griese out of the booth. MNF really is having a tough time finding a good crew. Need to find another crew like dandy Don, Curt Gowdy and Howard Cossell or another of the few good ones they had back in the day.
I think that Louis Riddick has an agent that is doing his job and getting his name onto headlines for future positions. After all, NJ.com has also provided Mr Riddick as all but hired just in case the Giants wanted to interview him again.
Lou Riddick & The Velvet Underground.
Seems like a knowledgeable and level headed guy who would make a great GM
Whoever the GM is it doesn’t take a genius to take Justin Fields with the #2 pick.
Unless of course your a Detroit team: Marvin Barnes over Moses Malone; Fred Williams over Bernie Ferderko, Gene Lamont over Johnny Bench, Pat Swilling over Willie Roaf just to start!