When Sean McDermott was fired on Monday, it changed everything for the NFL’s ongoing 2026 hiring cycle.
For the Cleveland Browns, especially, Buffalo entering the mix, with the obvious draw of MVP quarterback Josh Allen, tossed a major wrench into their now weeks-long search for a head coach. On Wednesday morning, NFL insider Tom Pelissero laid out exactly why.
Late to the party, the Bills are lining up their first wave of interviews. The early frontrunners for their job appear to be current offensive coordinator Joe Brady, who’s built a solid rapport with Allen, and former Bills OC and New York Giants head coach Brian Daboll, who’s gotten the best out of Allen in the past.
There’s another young candidate on Buffalo’s list, however, and the news has Browns fans spiraling and placing owner Jimmy Haslam's whole process under the microscope.
Grant Udinski suddenly has another suitor, and Browns fans are spiraling
It would not be surprising if mutual interest emerges between McDermott and the Browns. If he wants to coach in 2026, Cleveland represents McDermott’s best option, with a ready-made defense and some obvious young talent on the roster to work with. Pittsburgh and Baltimore would both make some sense, too, but the Ravens are multiple weeks into their search at this point, and Brian Flores, with his previous ties to the Steelers, has a leg up on McDermott at this point.
Cleveland’s going to have to add candidates to its current pool, one way or another. With Mike McDaniel dropping out of the race, with his eye on coaching Justin Herbert with the Los Angeles Chargers, the Browns are now linked to only five candidates: Jim Schwartz, Todd Monken, Udinski, Jesse Minter, and Nate Scheelhaase.
Of that group, only Scheelhaase satisfies the league’s Rooney Rule, which requires each team to conduct in-person interviews with at least two external minority or female candidates. That means, although the Browns will conduct a second interview with Udinski on Friday, they can’t block him from meeting with Buffalo, even if he emerges as their top choice and they want to hire him.
The Browns are prohibited from interviewing Scheelhaase, the current passing game coordinator of the Los Angeles Rams, until after the NFC Championship Game, so this coming Monday, at the earliest. In other words, Cleveland can’t make a hire this week, unless it somehow pulls off a scramble drill to satisfy league hiring rules prior to Friday (which is not happening, given the poor optics of such a move).
Udinski just turned 30 years old, so it’s hardly a guarantee that Buffalo will go all-in on the ascending offensive coordinator of the Jacksonville Jaguars. But both Brady and Daboll coached under McDermott’s tenure, and if the Bills prefer a fresh perspective from an elite offensive mind — and a coach who did wonders for Sam Darnold in Minnesota, and Trevor Lawrence in Jacksonville — Udinski could quickly emerge as a serious candidate in Buffalo.
If given the choice between a full-on offensive rebuild, with Shedeur Sanders, Deshuan Watson and Dillon Gabriel at QB, and a near-Super Bowl ready roster with arguably the best quarterback in football, it’s really no contest. It will be hard for the Browns to sell themselves to candidates when up against Buffalo, and Cleveland’s ill-prepared approach to the Rooney Rule has it in danger of getting burned.