Michael Lombardi of the National Football Post has a nice article questioning the Buffalo Bills hiring of Chan Gailey as their head coach. In the article, he says the Chiefs GM Scott Pioli nearly promoted Gailey to head coach last year.
Gailey was almost hired last year by Chiefs general manager Scott Pioli to be the head coach, but because Pioli didn't think he could sell Gailey to the media or the Kansas City fan base as the man to rebuild the team's fortunes, he passed, opting to keep him as offensive coordinator.
Interesting. Last year about this time, I tried to make the case for the Chiefs to hire Gailey on as head coach. I guess I didn't realize how close that was to actually happening.
The part that does concern me - if this report is accurate - is that the GM would choose someone other than the guy he wanted because of how the fans might perceive the hiring. Pioli certainly hasn't operated that way thus far in Kansas City.
He has often gone against the grain that caused a bit of a fan uproar - trading Tony Gonzalez and drafting Tyson Jackson to name a couple - so I'm not sure why he wouldn't have made the Gailey move then if he thought it was the right choice.
(H/T Chiefs Planet)