4 coaches Seattle Seahawks should not choose to replace Pete Carroll

Seattle does not need to chase Lincoln Riley

There is one way Lincoln Riley leaving USC and coming to the Seahawks could work. That would be if Seattle hires Riley, then trades up into the top of the 2024 NFL draft, and then the Seahawks choose quarterback Caleb Williams. Williams played under Riley at USC, of course. The weirdness, however, is that after a Heisman Trophy-winning season in 2022, Williams didn't play as well in 2023 and the team only went 8-5 and lost five of their last seven games.

Riley's team are very good offensively as Riley is historically an offensive coach, but Riley's teams are not very good defensively, at least not consistently. Riley reminds me quite a bit of Kliff Kingsbury, who Riley hired at USC for 2023 after Kingsbury was fired as the Arizona Cardinals coach after last season. Both are in their early 40s and have a good mind for an offense, but making a jump from college to the NFL doesn't work out very well most of the time.

Whichever coach is hired, I am hoping they have NFL experience. Even if Riley had never been a head coach in the NFL but a coordinator I would feel iffy about it, but Riley did not play in the NFL and has never coached in the league. I think that is asking for too much of a jump.

Coaches do seem to transition better from coaching in the NFL to coaching in college. Pete Carroll did that, of course. Jim Harbaugh just won a championship with Michigan (maybe aided by some cheating) and he went from the NFL to college. But the reverse rarely works well.