The phone call lasted five minutes.
When Josh McDaniels called Colts general manager Chris Ballard on Tuesday night to tell him he was backing out of the verbal agreement they had for him to take over as the Indianapolis head coach, Ballard needed — and wanted — no explanation as to why.
“It was a pretty short conversation,” Ballard said Wednesday in a news conference to address McDaniels’ stunning 11th-hour reversal. “He said he had bad news for me, and I said, ‘I just need a yes or no answer: Are you in or out?’
“I said, ‘OK, we’re moving forward. I wish you the best of luck.’ There was no persuasion [in an effort to change McDaniels’ mind]. Let me make this clear: We want a head coach that wants to be all-in. We’ve got work to do, and I want someone that’s 100 percent committed to partnering with us in getting that work done.”
Ballard has been dealing with the tragic death of Colts linebacker Edwin Jackson, who along with his Uber driver was killed by an alleged drunken driver Sunday. He was strong, stern and confident in his press conference, vowing the Colts will find the right man to lead them.
“Just because you’re the first choice doesn’t make you the right choice,” Ballard said. “It’s about getting the right guy. Sometimes things work out the way they’re supposed to work out. I don’t have a timetable. To me, it’s about being right. It doesn’t matter if you’re the first out of the box or last one to make a hire. We want to be right.
“We will get the right leader for the Indianapolis Colts that believes what we believe and wants to go where we want to go. I’m very confident in this.”
The immediate leader in the clubhouse as the next Colts coach would appear to be Eagles offensive coordinator Frank Reich, who oddly didn’t have a lot of traction in these last rounds of head-coaching openings. Certainly, Reich’s stock rose as a result of the job he did in the Super Bowl LII win over New England on Sunday in Minneapolis.
Other potential candidates include Eagles quarterbacks coach John DeFilippo and Eagles defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz, who’s a former head coach in Detroit, or Chiefs special teams coordinator Dave Toub. Other possibilities include former Titans head coach Mike Munchak or Bruce Arians, who left the Cardinals after this season.
“Josh McDaniels is a good football coach and I wish him the best going forward,’’ Ballard said.
This last-minute jilting of an organization that had committed to him has to have sabotaged McDaniels’ future as an NFL head coach anywhere outside of New England, where he’d better hope he’s Bill Belichick’s successor. McDaniels’ word around the league right now is worth nothing.
“Josh McDaniels burned a lot of bridges he doesn’t even know about,’’ former league general manager and current NFL Network analyst Charley Casserly said Wednesday. “I’m told he pursued this job, that he went after this job. Well, shame on him if he did.”
One fun fact: The Colts play the Patriots next season at Gillette Stadium.
“The rivalry is back on,’’ Ballard said as he walked off the podium, referring to days when the Colts and Patriots were rivals in the playoffs, when Peyton Manning and Tom Brady battled up until the Colts accused the Patriots of deflating the footballs before the teams’ 2015 AFC Championship game in New England.