Mooch is new coach-Terry Foster says on 1660am kzoo
Zman1024
is the new coach and will be announced tomorrow or Wednesday. Also
another"insider says the reason it took so long is that Mooch wanted to be
director of player personel also. Apparently the Lions did not agree to this
but he took the job anyway.
ZMAN
Robert Solari
ESPN.com
While there remains one minor element to navigate, ESPN.com has learned that
the Detroit Lions and Steve Mariucci have reached agreement on all of the
major components of a five-year contract, and that the deal should be
completed Tuesday with an introductory press conference likely Wednesday.
Sources close to negotiations insisted Monday night that the last remaining
item to be completed is not a deal-breaker and that Mariucci has definitely
decided to accept the job. In fact, sources said, Mariucci has spent the
past couple days mulling over potential staff members.
"It's too far along now not to happen," said a league source. "Actually, it
probably could have been done a few days ago, but (Mariucci) just wanted to
sleep on it a while. But it's about as done as done can be without having
officially signed the thing."
The Lions issued a statement Monday afternoon which said that a deal was not
yet in place but that an agreement could be reached Tuesday.
"While there was significant progress ... no deal has yet been finalized
that would make Steve our next head coach," spokesman Bill Keenist said in
the statement. "We are hopeful that an agreement can be reached with Steve
by the end of the day (Tuesday)."
The contract, ESPN.com confirmed, will pay Mariucci more than $4 million
annually. He was to have earned a base salary of $2.25 million for 2003
under his old contract with the 49ers. That salary for 2003 was to have been
paid out over a 30-month period.
In addition to financial implications, with Mariucci set to move to new
status among the league's highest-paid head coaches, he will have more input
into football decisions than during a six-year San Francisco tenure.
Mariucci, 47, will have the title of head coach only, but the contract with
the Lions will permit him to review and participate in football-related
decisions. His new job represents a homecoming of sorts for Mariucci, who
was born and raised in Iron Mountain, Mich., and who played collegiately at
Northern Michigan, where he was a three-time All-American quarterback.
The hiring of Mariucci figures to be a popular one with long-suffering Lions
fans, whose teams won just five games over the last two seasons, under the
stewardship of Marty Mornhinweg. Ironically, Mornhinweg was offensive
coordinator for Mariucci in San Francisco before taking the Detroit job.
Detroit has not advanced to the playoffs since 1999, as a wild card entry,
and Mariucci will inherit a team that is clearly in a rebuilding mode. There
is, at least, a solid cornerstone in quarterback Joey Harrington, the team's
top pick in the 2002 draft.
The pending addition means the end of a two-year pursuit by Lions president
Matt Millen, who originally wanted Mariucci for the job in 2001, but could
not extricate him from his 49ers contract then. It also means that Millen
won his gamble in dismissing Mornhinweg last Monday.
After initially indicating Mornhinweg would be back with the Lions for the
2003 season, Millen reversed direction, and fired him once Mariucci became
available. Millen acknowledged that the only circumstance that changed was
the availability if Mariucci and, had he not landed him, the failure would
not have sat well with Lions fans.
Mariucci, in fact, was the only candidate ever publicly acknowledged by the
Lions or by Millen.
It remains to be seen how, or even if, Detroit will come into compliance
with a league guideline that mandates franchises interview minority
candidates for head coach and high-ranking front office positions. The club
was turned down by some black coaches, who perceived that Mariucci was the
only true candidate for the job, and who did not want to be part of a sham
process.
Then again, there could have been candidates whose identities were never
made public.
In his six seasons with the 49ers, Mariucci compiled a 60-43 record and took
the club to the playoffs on four occasions.
He was fired last month, after the 49ers' loss at Tampa Bay in the
divisional round of the playoffs. San Francisco officials suggested Mariucci
had sought additional power in the organization, which they said did not fit
into their structure. Mariucci denied he ever wanted to be anything but head
coach.
hol
Dave
"Robert Solari" <ro...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:YnG%9.31454$zF6.2...@bgtnsc04-news.ops.worldnet.att.net...
SamIamZ75
making. Boy, I sure wish this happened in the real world.