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July 24, 2025 10 mins
“Is Brian Schottenheimer the Sean McVay before Sean McVay?”
That’s the provocative question Ben Rogers, Jeff “Skin” Wade, Kevin “KT” Turner, and Krystina Ray tackle in this riveting and hilarious deep dive into the wild coaching journey of Cowboys offensive coordinator Brian Schottenheimer.In this episode of The Ben and Skin Show, the crew unpacks a jaw-dropping article from The Athletic that reveals Schottenheimer’s near-misses with head coaching gigs, his chaotic stint under Urban Meyer, and the surprising leadership style that’s got Cowboys fans buzzing. From turning down the Dolphins and Bills to surviving the toxic circus in Jacksonville, Schottenheimer’s story is one of resilience, grit, and a whole lot of football drama.
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Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ben and Skin Show ninety one point one The Eagle,
Thank you for hanging out with us today. Big Friday
show tomorrow, and it'll be your last chance to win
tickets to a volbeat and hailstorm. Remember one lucky winner
this week is going to get that meet and greet action.
How cool is that?

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Right now, it'd be time for this. The thing's big.
I thought you guys would like this.

Speaker 3 (00:25):
It's an article that dropped yesterday on The Athletic from
a guy named Mike Silver, who's a good reporter.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
Yeah, and it's about Brian Schottenheimer.

Speaker 1 (00:32):
And hold on, Mike Silver is the guy that Hannah's
Storm was buddies with att yep.

Speaker 3 (00:38):
Yeah he good. So let's go back to January two
thousand and seven. The Dolphins had this situation where Nick
Saban just abruptly left to go to Alabama, and so
they're needing to coach and Brian Schottenheimer at the time
is a play caller for the New York Jets. So
the Dolphins owner flies up there private playing to go
see Brian Schottenheimer and he's sitting there and listening and

(01:01):
he's like, Schottenheimer's like, man, I think I'm pretty good
at what I'm doing right now. I think there will
be more opportunities for me. So he ends up declining
the Dolphins job in O seven, So he could have
been a head coach in two thousand and seven.

Speaker 2 (01:14):
They offered him the gig and O seven Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:16):
And is at that time, isn't Jason Garrett on that
staff as the quarterback coach?

Speaker 2 (01:20):
You know, that's a good question.

Speaker 3 (01:21):
I don't even I don't know if that timeline matches up,
because but it might.

Speaker 1 (01:25):
That's how Jason Garrett got hooked up with Nick Saban.
He was Saban's quarterback coach in Miami before Saban went
to Alabama.

Speaker 2 (01:32):
And that's where all that connection is.

Speaker 3 (01:34):
That sounds like that could probably probably mesh, Yeah, looks
like it. Yeah, coach, No, Jason and O seven was
the offensive coordinator of the Cowboys. Oh he was the Yeah,
he was the QB coach of the Dolphins before that. No.
Five and six though, Okay, okay, gotcha. So the O
six season had just ended and that's when that happened.
Three years later, Schottenheimer had a clear path to the

(01:56):
Bill's head coaching job. He says in the interview, said
I was a little lot naive. I assumed it would
always happen, but what I've learned is it's never guaranteed.

Speaker 2 (02:05):
He did. He turned down the Bills job in twenty ten.

Speaker 1 (02:07):
Oh so he's turned down two good AFC East jobs because.

Speaker 3 (02:11):
Why well he the Bills He had trepidation about the city.
Buffalo is not great, and he just kind of thought,
I'm gonna get an opportunity that makes sense.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
Now, I want you guys to know this.

Speaker 3 (02:24):
In ninety seven he was an assistant for the Rams,
ninety eight assistant for the Chiefs, ninety nine wide receivers,
coach for the Syracuse for Syracuse in college two thousand,
tight ends coach for USC, one QB coach for Washington.

Speaker 2 (02:36):
D uh.

Speaker 3 (02:38):
Then he was the QB coach with the Chargers. He
bounced around before he got his head coaches for ten years.
He's put in his time.

Speaker 2 (02:44):
We all know that. Yeah, but why was he bounced
around so much?

Speaker 3 (02:46):
I wonder, Uh, Well, a couple of them was just
like a better opportunity and maybe a pay raise as well. Yeah,
he thought his dad step up. Once he got to one,
he followed his dad. So this day in Washington and
then with the Chargers when he went there to end
his career. So he basically this article is like he

(03:07):
learned the hard way, and he spent the next fifteen
years going, am I ever going to get to be
a coach even though he's put.

Speaker 2 (03:11):
In a lot of time here.

Speaker 3 (03:13):
Last January, Jerry and the other decision makers were pondering
whether to keep McCarthy. We all know this, but they
began talking about shoddy Shotty didn't see it coming.

Speaker 2 (03:23):
He's doing his end of season, you know, the.

Speaker 3 (03:25):
Self scout report basically, and go in and just had
the big evaluation. And Steven said, at first he was
wearing his coaching stuff, but then he started, you know,
the reports start coming out, and he started wearing like
a suit and tie to the office.

Speaker 2 (03:37):
He knew he's got a chance to get the job.

Speaker 3 (03:39):
Oh wow, but it's been a dozen hiring cycles since
he had gotten a formal head coaching interview. Will mcclay's
quoted in the article saying, the unique thing about him
is he is the old wiz kid. Back then. He
was the whiz kid before all the new whiz kids
came up. So like he was the next hot name,
the hot young play caller, in this article, he's referred

(04:00):
to is the Sean McVay before Sean McVay, which.

Speaker 2 (04:03):
I've never thought of him as that, but that's where
we are.

Speaker 3 (04:08):
Despite Marty was known for kind of being a hard
ass and a disciplinarian.

Speaker 2 (04:13):
He is.

Speaker 3 (04:14):
He takes his leadership style actor Pete Carroll and Dan Quinn.
So Mike is gonna love Brian Schottenheimer.

Speaker 2 (04:21):
Well, he's already been around him though, right, Yeah, of
course a little bit.

Speaker 3 (04:24):
But it's all about like staying positive and hiving high
energy and all that stuff.

Speaker 2 (04:28):
Pete Carroll's known for that, right to his assistant in Washington.
O five.

Speaker 3 (04:32):
These were the Chargers he interviewed for the Ravens jobs
in seven, but they hired John Harbaugh. Okay, got beat out. Tough,
good guy who won Super Bowl. The Jets hired Rex
Ryan and he because he was trying to get that job.
And then but he's like, okay, so he's the O C.
And they're like, we want to run the ball because
we have Mark Sanchez and we have a good defense.
They go to the AFC Championship game twice in a

(04:54):
row with him calling plays.

Speaker 2 (04:56):
Okay, so that's pretty good. Pretty good you.

Speaker 3 (04:59):
Fast forward twenty eighteen, he's with Seattle, but he got
an interview to get the Bengals job, but they gave
it to Zach Taylor because Zach Taylor was in the
Sean McVay coaching tree.

Speaker 2 (05:11):
So that's where another opportunity that goes there for.

Speaker 3 (05:13):
Him, and like no, in twenty twenty, he basically got
caught between the Pete Carroll Russell Wilson falling out and
the situation goes like this. He gets along with Pete
Carroll now, but Pete Carroll did have to fire him
early in the twenty twenty season. Russell Wilson, who has
been named the New York Giants starting quarterback. By the way,

(05:34):
Russell openly spoke about wanting to be the league MVP.
And Russell's got his own team and does his own thing,
and that's where the let Russ Cook things started. Russ's
team put that, and then the fans and media started
running with it. So it got bad when let Russ
Cook is happening and Shottenheimer's calling more pass plays than

(05:55):
he would like to, and you're kind of getting outside
of managing the game. Russ starts playing Russ Ball and
throwing interceptions and things like that. So Pete Carroll's like,
I don't recognize the offense, dude, we gotta fire you.
So he's got to go. And I never had clarity
on that. I thought it was a situation where everyone
was mad at Shottenheimer because he's forcing the run. It's

(06:15):
not really so much that. It's that Russ had so
much power in the dynamic in the organization. And that's
why I think it's interesting that Shottenheimer and Pete Carroll
get along great now because I had always kind of
wondered if that was bad.

Speaker 2 (06:28):
So it's good to know, Steph.

Speaker 4 (06:30):
You didn't know, right, So is the idea that Russ
was making the offense whatever he wanted it to be,
so it didn't matter who the coordinator was. The quarterback
had so much power he get audible and whatever he
wants pretty much.

Speaker 3 (06:41):
And then you know, you're kind of you're working because
Russ is good at the time, still you're kind of,
how can we win games and keep everyone happy?

Speaker 2 (06:48):
And that's what Shotenhemer was trying to do.

Speaker 3 (06:50):
So following that season in which Seattle won the NFC
West and put up more points than anytime they had
enfranchise history. Schottenheimer got fired. Were a good offense and
he got fired, and I didn't realize that. I'd never
think about that stuff. Okay, then his dad was in hospice, right,
he was gonna sit out twenty twenty one. But then
he starts getting beat up over the text by urban

(07:12):
Meyer because urban Meyer was getting the Jacksonville Jaguars shot.

Speaker 2 (07:16):
And he's like, man, I don't know, so I guys
didn't take the year off. My dad's kind of dying.

Speaker 3 (07:19):
Here. Urban Meyer is relentless. Come on, man, this will
be great. This is what your dad would have wanted.
You get a chance to coach a number one pick.
This will be great. Come on, come on. So he
takes the job with encouragement from his wife and Marty's
wife Pat.

Speaker 2 (07:33):
He takes the job in Jacksonville shot.

Speaker 3 (07:37):
He said in the article, my gut told me not
to do it, Okay, But then he's like, he got
told basically his wife and Marty's wife.

Speaker 2 (07:46):
His mom talked him into it.

Speaker 1 (07:48):
So then, man, urban Meyer is such a bus It's
so bad. He's such a butthole.

Speaker 3 (07:53):
This is where I think you guys are gonna love
Shoddy or at least start to like him, at least
I'm gonna read this prayrift to you, And Brian Schottenheimer
wishes he'd turn around and run the other direction. He
later learned that urban Meyer had already offered former Chargers
coach Mike McCoy the job as quarterbacks coach, so he'd
already given the job to someone else, or offered the

(08:13):
job to someone else while he was offering the job
to Brian Schottenheimer, and that McCoy had been working in
the team facility for several days while urban Meyer was
still texting Shott eachin need him to come in.

Speaker 4 (08:25):
Why is he doing that?

Speaker 3 (08:26):
So Mike McCoy was already there. So he gets there
and Mike McCoy's already there. He's like, oh, I've been
here for a week. He's like what. So Schottenheimer called
it an s show, So there was a big disaster.
We all remember the thing at the steakhouse when urban
Meyer chose to not fly home with the team after
Thursday night football and it's grinding on the college girl
the co ed at the bar and lets it out there.

Speaker 2 (08:47):
It was coldplay before coldplay.

Speaker 3 (08:49):
They said it was a steady stream of mistrusted bullying
in Jacksonville. But there's a meeting, a coach's meeting in November,
and according to a witness there, urban Meyer but rated
all his assistants. He's calling them out one by one,
what have you ever won? Most of them stammered in response.

(09:10):
Then he singles out Brian Schottenheimer, and Brian Schottenheimer goes,
I've won everywhere I've been.

Speaker 2 (09:15):
He stood up to the bully in charge.

Speaker 3 (09:19):
Then you know, urban Meyer got fired a month later,
so he had the balls to go up to urban Meyer,
his boss at the time, and say, I went everywhere.

Speaker 2 (09:28):
You're not gonna do this to me.

Speaker 3 (09:30):
This got me excited for Brian Schottenneimer, and I have
no idea what the offense is gonna look like. The
early reports from camp is that they're using a lot
of motion and they're moving guys around, and you say, whatever.

Speaker 2 (09:38):
They're on pads, it doesn't matter. We won't know until
it's time.

Speaker 3 (09:40):
But he's not some bumbling idiot that he's kind of
been turned into because he hadn't been a head coach before.

Speaker 1 (09:45):
You know, my favorite thing that I mean, you don't
want to put too much on clips. You see One
of my favorite things that I've seen coming out of
camp is turping as a running back. Yeah, I just
think you figure out ways to get that guy of
the ball and give him a sliver of space and
big plays can happen.

Speaker 2 (10:00):
Then you know they're gonna be able to throw the ball.

Speaker 4 (10:03):
I mean, if Dak stays healthy, they can blog the
tackles could be bad that they can buy him a
little time. But you've got two elite receivers now, not
just one. I just don't think they're gonna be able
to run the ball. I think that's gonna be their
biggest issue. But yeah, man, that is definitely encouraging. That's
a lot of positive stuff for him. That's beyond just
having a cool nickname.

Speaker 2 (10:22):
That flah good stuff. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (10:24):
I'll never forget the time that KT looked urban Meyer
dead in his cold black eyes and he said to him,
the pun is a bit of a mystery, and urban
Meyer said not to me, and he started grinding on everything. Uh, Christina,
you got to ground play some music, all right? Christina's
next right here on the Eagle.

Speaker 2 (10:42):
There you going, Well, I want to get my sock bag.
Dude's the beef
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