Hur Hur! You huys lost to the pack!
If anyone should be blamed, it's the coaching staff or AJ's desicion to get rid of ALL of his coaches BEFORE firing marty.
You're not from san diego are you?
If you were, you'd take back that statement completely.
Here's what happened:
Mid 2006 season: AJ and Marty called into owner dean spano's office. Both told to "play nice" and work together. this feud took off when AJ had traded QB cleo lemon to Miami for A.J. Feeley and a 6th round pick. Marty still had wanted Lemon to be on the team.
Post Playoffs 2006 season: Decision was made almost days after the playoff loss that Schottenheimer would remain head coach for at least one more year for the chargers.
Offseason spring 2007: Cam Cameron selected to coach miami dolphins. THere was no doubt that Cameron would leave, especially since the year before he was very close to becoming a head coach elsewhere. Also soon after, Wade Phillips was selected as head coach for the cowboys. As stated in NFL rules you CANNOT block a coordinator from becoming a head coach or an upgraded coaching position elsewhere. This rule also goes for specfic coaching positions like linebackers coach.
- Clarence Shelmon at the time was upgraded from the running backs coach to the offensive coordinator position. There was zero conflict there and that decision was mutally agreed upon.
- when Phillips got fired, all the conflict started because Marty had seriously nominated his brother, Kurt schottenheimer to become the defensive coordinator. This was severely frowned upon by AJ, which resulted in SPANOS (the owner) letting go of Schottenheimer.
Important backstory: Upon Marty's original hiring in San Diego, Marty had wanted to put his relatives into coaching positions for san diego. THis was seriously frowned upon by then GM john Butler and the spanos family. It was agreed upon that MArty would only hire one family member, his son, to become QB coaches. Marty's son is now offensive coordinator for New York Jets.
The real situation was that the front office/coaching conflict had just become too massive. Marty clearly wanted to go in a different direction that was not agreed upon by the chargers front office. The coordinators could not be touched at all because of league rules.
There. THat's what happened. No more questions on the coaching debacle before norv was hired. Please keep the criticism on him, and AJ for hiring him, not for letting marty go.
Thank you.
