Why do you think Zimmer is a good HC?

Gruden is a decent coach... why not offer him a position like the Bengals did with Hue Jackson last year? He's quite familiar with Kirk Cousins.

I'm saying this off the top of my head, but I think Cousins and Gruden were happy together. I know most of the problems occurred when the Redskins used fishy methods to oust GM Scot McCloughan, then the new regime lowballed Kirk. I don't think Gruden was involved in that, but I could be wrong.

Anyone who thinks Zimmer isn't a good coach must have a very short memory. He's objectively good, there's no valid argument against it.

I don't necessarily agree with what Gruden said. How does he know how other GM/HC relationships work? I can see it working that way in Washington sure, but I don't see Spielman forcing a whole lot on Zimmer without his input. And if a GM is doing that, then they should be fired because that makes no sense to me. A HC should know better than anyone which players will work in his system. If Spielman isn't including Zimmer in some personnel decisions, then I can only ask why. That doesn't reflect well on the coach IMO.

That's because you're conflating 2 different arguments here. Zimmer tells the Stef/Kubiak what he wants/expects on offense, his philosophy, then they take care of the rest. The problem is, Zim doesn't have the first clue about offense, his offensive philosophy is predicated on protecting his defense. We want him more involved on offense as in learning more and being smarter instead of trying to force the guys who do run the offense to come up with some plan that hasn't worked since the 70's.

Exactly, he doesn't know what he's doing. He should either remove himself completely from the offenses side of things, or he should learn more. The data is out there, being conservative is not the best strategy for success. Everything you listed there, leads to more stalled drives and more 3 n outs. We're more concerned about not making mistakes than scoring points, aka playing not to lose.

That's the magical thing about winning, it cures everything. We'll see what happens when that strategy stops working.

He's objectively good as in he's above .500, but is that objectively good enough? That's the argument. The pro-Zimmer crowd seems to be content with the annual 8-8 or 10-6 wildcard appearance when it's going to take more than that to fill the trophy case. You guys are a lot like Zimmer, you're playing not to lose. You're worried things could get worse if we bring in someone else. We could also bring in someone who is better who could get us over the hump. This worked for the Bucs in 2002. Fired Dungy who couldn't get the Bucs to the next level and they immediately won a Super Bowl with Gruden. The Vikings defense is established, and if we brought in an offensive mind, we could have a 2 year window to get it done before the defense falls off. The defense wouldn't necessarily regress immediately after Zim is fired unless the new guy completely overhauls everything, which I don't think he'd do with our defense.

The 2002 Bucs didn't forget how to play defense just because Dungy was no longer there, in fact they were so much better only allowing 196 points. Dungy had them at 8-8, 10-6 and giving up 230-280 points. Gruden comes in and they only allow 196 and go 12-4. It was immediately back to mediocrity after that but who cares? They got their Super Bowl.