Bob Stoops, who put Oklahoma back on the college football map, may get a chance to do the same thing with the Cleveland Browns.
Stoops, fresh off winning a national championship with the Sooners, said Browns President Carmen Policy has been trying to reach him for the last two days, perhaps to discuss the team’s coaching vacancy.
The Browns fired Chris Palmer, who went 5-27 during two turbulent seasons in Cleveland, on Thursday and Stoops may already be on the club’s short list of candidates.
Stoops, who grew up in nearby Youngstown rooting for the Browns, expressed interest in the Cleveland job when he was informed of Palmer’s dismissal while in Scottsdale, Ariz., where he accepted a coaching award.
“Well, I just found it was open,” Stoops told the Tulsa World. “But, sure, I’d talk to them. I’ve always been intrigued by the NFL. And it would certainly be a job close to my home.”
Oklahoma Athletic Director Joe Castiglione said he had a brief phone conversation with Stoops and that Stoops told him he and not yet been contacted by the Browns.
Chiefs make it official: Dick Vermeil was overcome by emotion twice while being formally presented as the Kansas City Chiefs’ new coach.
Both times he was talking about the way Chiefs President Carl Peterson and Vice President Lynn Stiles talked him out of a comfortable retirement.
“The fact I changed my mind was based solely upon my personal relationship with Carl Peterson and Lynn Stiles,” Vermeil said.
The Chiefs, who haven’t been in the playoffs in three years and haven’t won a playoff game since 1993, gave the 64-year-old Vermeil a three-year, $10 million contract.
Redskins fire 2: Terry Robiskie, the interim coach of the Washington Redskins after Norv Turner was fired, has been dropped by Marty Schottenheimer.
Schottenheimer, hired last week as head coach, said Robiskie and linebackers coach Foge Fazio have been fired.
Schottenheimer also made his first hiring, bringing in longtime college assistant Hue Jackson to coach the running backs, while former head coaches Chris Palmer and Bruce Coslet appeared as candidates for the offensive coordinator position.
Jaguars’ changes: Jacksonville Jaguars coach Tom Coughlin relented and promoted quarterbacks coach Bob Petrino to offensive coordinator, ending his own two-year tenure in the position.
The 39-year-old Petrino came to Jacksonville as quarterbacks coach two years ago from Louisville.
Rams hire aide: Head coach Mike Martz completed reorganizing his staff by hiring Ron Meeks, an NFL assistant for the last 10 seasons, as defensive backs coach.
Clements to Steelers: Former Notre Dame star Tom Clements was hired as the Steelers’ quarterbacks coach–the first time the team has filled that position since 1973.
Wanna bet? Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) is backing the New York Giants in Sunday’s NFC championship game with some cheesecake and maple syrup on them in a political wager with Sen. Mark Dayton (D-Minn.).
Dayton is betting two pounds of Minnesota wild rice, two pounds of Minnesota cheese and the book “How to Talk Minnesotan” by Howard Mohr. Clinton is putting up New York cheesecake, upstate maple syrup and the Toni Morrison book “Jazz.”
In the AFC title game, it’s a bushel of Maryland crabs put up by Gov. Parris Glendening against a case of Napa Valley’s finest red wine from Gov. Gray Davis. Or a Mexican dinner from Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown against more crabs from Baltimore Mayor Martin O’Malley.
Overdose killed Gilliam: Former Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Joe Gilliam, who died on Christmas at 49, was killed by an accidental cocaine overdose, according to the Nashville medical examiner, Dr. Bruce Levy.
