Black Monday news: Head coach, GM firings are officially underway

The San Francisco 49ers were the first team to part ways with their coach, but it is only just getting started. Black Monday is officially underway. It makes the day after the close of the regular season, in which teams clean house as they look to right the wrongs of the recent past.

Black Monday is important for our purposes because it means there are more openings to compete with when it comes to coaching interviews. Additionally, it means teams could come sniffing around the 49ers front office for potential GM candidates. The 49ers have retained much of their front office and coaching staff in recent year, but obviously there will be tremendous turnover on the coaching staff, and potentially some in the front office.

Matt Maiocco sent out this tweet, as GM Trent Baalke is expected to meet with the coaching staff today.

Offensive assistants most likely 49ers want to retain are Tom Rathman (RBs) and Mike Solari (O-line). Both holdovers from previous staff.

— Matt Maiocco (@MaioccoCSN) December 29, 2014

For now, the early news indicates the New York Jets have fired Rex Ryan, the Atlanta Falcons have fired Mike Smith, and the Chicago Bears have fired Marc Trestman. The Bears have also fired GM Phil Emery. The Jets are expected to fire GM John Idzik, and there is no word yet on if the Raiders will go with someone other than Tony Sparano has head coach. It seems logical to look at other coaches, but we'll see.

I'll be traveling much of the day, but will have internet access on my flight. I'll leave this as a Black Monday open thread, and we'll have plenty of other information.