Friday evening, Ian Rapoport reported that the Cardinals have a new offensive coordinator on the interview radar and it’s none other than Hue Jackson. As you may know, Jackson was the head coach of the Cleveland Browns to start the 2018 season, but finished his season as an offensive assistant for the Cincinnati Bengals after the Browns fired him in October. Going 3-36-1 in three seasons will do that to you. According to Rapoport, the interview happened Friday, so San Francisco 49ers fans can wait all weekend to see what the result of this is. And yes, we want this to happen.
Jackson has had success as an offensive coordinator, look no further than his previous stints with the Bengals to see his offenses have some productivity. There’s just a small difference: the Cardinals talent doesn’t even come near the talent he had in Cincinnati. We may make fun of Andy Dalton, but he’s not Josh Rosen, at least not right now. Larry Fitzgerald and David Johnson are really the only pieces Jackson could work with, and Fitzgerald may not even be around for 2019. So that leaves a running back and a quarterback in desperate need of an offensive line. Not exactly an attractive offense.
It’s rather interesting that the Cardinals would be the team to bring Jackson in. After all, new head coach Kliff Kingsbury is 35-40 during his time as head coach of Texas A&M, so perhaps Jackson is in good company.
From an NFC West perspective, this would be interesting for the sole fact it’s hard to see how this works out, at least in the short-term. This of course leads to the 49ers hopefully putting an end to the list of losses to the Cardinals.
But I’m looking at this more of the ghosts of Black Monday’s past. Anyone remember the days of Geep Chryst as the OC or Curtis Modkins for that matter? Remember how hard it was for the 49ers to get someone, anyone to come join the regimes of Tomsula and Kelly?
Boy, I’m glad the 49ers are past those coaching days of hell. Have fun, Arizona.