The Buffalo Bills have made one head-scratching decision after another this week, closing it out by adding Mike McDaniel and Philip Rivers to their pool of potential head coach candidates, as both men interviewed for the vacant position with the team Friday morning.
Rivers has coaching experience, but it’s just at the high school level down in Fairhope, Alabama. As someone who is originally from that area of the country, it’s worth noting that Rivers' private school team isn’t playing at the same level as the large public schools in the Alabama Bay Area and Gulf Coast that feed talent to the Division 1 level regularly.
Nonetheless, they’re one of the top schools in their division, Alabama 4A, under Rivers. He has led the program to the Alabama state playoffs each of the past three seasons with a 42-16 overall record, with just three losses coming in the past two years.
Regardless, the jump from mid-level Alabama high school football to the NFL is colossal, and even that feels like understating it. The Bills’ very real interest in Rivers would be a historic move for the franchise if they do move forward with him as the next head coach.
Buffalo Bills would be venturing into historically rare territory with hiring Philip Rivers
As ESPN’s Adam Schefter pointed out on Friday, if the Bills do hire Rivers, he would be the third head coach in NFL history to be hired without any prior coaching experience in the league. Somewhat ironically, the Indianapolis Colts were the most recent team to make such a hire, employing former NFL center Jeff Saturday on an interim basis in 2022, two years after Rivers’ first retirement with the franchise.
Jeff Saturday in 2022 with the Colts was the last person named an NFL head coach — albeit on an interim basis — without any prior college or pro coaching experience.
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) January 23, 2026
Norm Van Brocklin in 1961 is the last person to be hired as a full-time NFL head coach without any prior college… https://t.co/zYayL4L8fM
Saturday went 1-7 and hasn’t had another coaching job since. Before taking the Colts job, Saturday had spent the prior three seasons as the head coach of Hebron Christian Academy in Georgia. The team reached the playoffs each of those three seasons, as Saturday finished his tenure there with a 20-16 overall record.
The first was Norm Van Brocklin, who the Minnesota Vikings hired in 1961 after a 12-year, Hall of Fame career as the quarterback of the Los Angeles Rams and Philadelphia Eagles. He spent six years with the Vikings, and seven with the Atlanta Falcons, and finished his NFL coaching career with a 66-100-7 record.
It was a different era of the NFL, of course, but Van Brocklin only had three winning seasons in 13 years on the sidelines.
Obviously, owner Tery Pegula and general manager Brandon Beane would be taking a massive risk by hiring Rivers. Still, Rivers has already shown he’s ready for unprecedented moments in NFL history. Just last month, he was quarterbacking the Colts at 44 years old, five years after he retired from the league.
Rivers didn’t save the Colts’ season as a player, but that doesn’t exactly mean his football genius isn’t worth some intrigue as the Bills’ next head coach.