NFL Rumors: Whatever team lands Bill Belichick could be forced into sad reality

There may be a reason why no team besides the Atlanta Falcons seems to be all that interested in hiring Bill Belichick to be their next head coach. Belichick had spent the last quarter of a century making the New England Patriots the Evil Empire. Well, after Tom Brady left for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in his NFL free agency, it became more smoke and mirrors than the Wizard of Oz.

According to Mike Giardi of the Boston Sports Journal, he suspects that Belichick is actively recruiting front-office personnel in New England to follow him to his next place of employment. The two names that keep coming up are director of scouting Eliot Wolf and director of player personnel Matt Groh. Keep in mind Belichick had been the Patriots' general manager throughout his reign.

“I did hear from two prominent league sources who believe Wolf and Matt Groh will eventually land wherever Belichick does. Admittedly, I had not considered that. Perhaps we’ll get a better sense of it in the coming days and weeks?"

This could be problematic at a place like Atlanta, where front office issues were not the problem leading to them firing their former head coach, Arthur Smith. You could argue that Falcons general manager Terry Fontenot has done an extraordinary job in his first three years in the role. Atlanta was in a terrible space with the salary cap prior to last year. He has hit on a ton of picks in the draft as well.

So yeah, let's bring in a bunch of front office executives who turned the Patriots into a pumpkin...

NFL rumors: Bill Belichick may want his own front office guys in next job

Without question, the biggest reason why the Patriots failed in the final years of Belichick's run there had everything to do with building a roster. Belichick had long not cared about the NFL Draft, as he valued using the waiver wire to mine bad teams' under-appreciated talent. He may have found many gems doing that, but without Brady running the offense, the Patriots became a just bunch of guys.

If Falcons owner Arthur Blank was smart, he would ask for Belichick to coach his players, Fontenot to draft and sign his players and ask team president Rich McKay how he would like to receive his golden parachute, whether that be by UPS, snail mail, and most certainly not FedEx. Blank is already paying a FedEx heir a ton of money to no longer be his head coach. Ask Belichick to only be the head coach.

To me, having Belichick bring in all of his guys is going to be a hard sell for much of this Falcons fan base. Will he have some of his guys come in? Sure, that is just par for the course when bringing in a new head coach. However, I sincerely doubt that Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh would be as particular about what he needs to be successful in Atlanta. That is why he is the preferred option.

Either head coaching candidate can work out well, but Belichick must not marginalize Fontenot.