Seattle Seahawks reportedly going defense heavy in early head coaching search

According to ESPN's Adam Schefter and the NFL Network's Tom Pelissero, the Seattle Seahawks have requested to interview four head coaching candidates to potentially replace Pete Carroll. The list is likely to grow, of course, but the four names reported are mentioned below. Three of the four coaches who will be interviewed are defensive coaches.

One might think that since Seahawks general manager John Schneider has his first chance to name a head coach in Seattle that Schneider might move away from Pete Carroll's defensive philosophy and grab an offensive-minded coach. This could still happen, obviously, but if the trend of coaching interviews continues, Schneider is thinking of a defensive coach to replace Carroll.

More reports will likely surface over the next few days on who the Seahawks are asking to interview. But here is what we know so far.

Seattle Seahawks reportedly have requested to interview these four head coaching candidates

Panthers defensive coordinator Ejiro Evero

Evero is a hot name right name. The Atlanta Falcons reported interviewed Evero over the weekend for their head coaching job. The Falcons will be among a number of teams interested in the 43-year-old Evero.

Evero was the defensive coordinator for the Denver Broncos in 2022 but Sean Payton stupidly chose not to try to retain him after Payton became the head coach last offseason. Denver's defense went from fantastic to awful in the first part of the 2023 season. Evero has NFC West experience as he was a defensive assistant for the Los Angeles Rams from 2017 through 2021.

Dolphins offensive coordinator Frank Smith

Smith is 42 years old and has been an NFL coach since 2010. For the last two seasons, he has been the Miami Dolphins' offensive coordinator. The problem with that is Smith does not call the offensive plays; head coach Mike McDaniel does that.

Smith likely has a good idea of how to run an offense, but jumping from an OC who doesn't call plays to head coach somewhere seems silly. He needs to probably go somewhere and prove he can call plays first. That won't happen as long as McDaniel is in Miami.

Cowboys defensive coordinator Dan Quinn

This is the most familiar name to 12s as Quinn was the DC for Seattle in 2013 and 2014. He also led the Falcons to the Super Bowl in 2016, though after building a huge lead at halftime, they ended up losing to the New England Patriots.

Quinn has had good results with the Cowboys, but he might not be well-received by Seahawks fans as this is a what-have-you-done-for-me-lately culture. Dallas was very good in the regular season defensively but then got blasted by the Green Bay Packers in the Wild Card game this weekend. That made Quinn look like a good regular season coach but one who could not adapt to the playoffs.

Rams defensive coordinator Raheem Morris

Morris, like Quinn, has head coaching experience, but not for some time. He was the HC for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers from 2010 into 2012 but no team has seen fit to hire him full-time as a head coach since. That seems odd.

While Morris does have experience as he has been coaching in the NFL since 2002, his hire would likely fail to impress. He has not proven to be any more than a decent defensive coaching assistant.