5 candidates to replace Dan Quinn as Atlanta Falcons head coach

As he should be, Bieniemy will be a candidate for any possible or likely head coaching opening after the season, including the New York Jets, Detroit Lions, Jacksonville Jaguars and Minnesota Vikings.

Basically, if you play professional football and are unsure about your head coach, Bieniemy needs to be your first call.

The Falcons have to have him on their list when Quinn is inevitably let go, and he’d probably at least take an interview with them.

Like Pete Carmichael alongside Sean Payton and Drew Brees in New Orleans, it’s easy to push Bieniemy’s contribution aside as Chiefs’ offensive coordinator with Andy Reid and the generational talent that is Patrick Mahomes. But no less authorities than Reid and Mahomes have cited Bieniemy’s importance to the Kansas City offense and head coaching future.

Reid: “I give him, every weekend, I sit down, we put together this game plan sheet with 200-plus plays on it and he memorizes every play, every formation, just — boom — on recall like that. And every week, I go, ‘Listen, are you good with this?’ And he goes, ‘No problem. I’ve got it.’ But a lot of hard work goes into it. Plus, he’s a brilliant dude.”

Mahomes: “When you get a guy like EB, who puts in the time, who is a great leader of players and men and somebody that can really control and have a presence in any room he walks in, you understand why these other teams are looking at him to be their head coach.”

The Chiefs biggest departure after the 2020 season feels sure to be Bieniemy. The odds of him becoming the Falcons next head coach seem remote right now, but there is a chance he’d consider them strongly and there’s nothing to keep them from entering the fray to hire him.