Jon Gruden on brother Jay's firing from Redskins: 'Welcome to the club, bro'
Just as one Gruden brother is getting in the swing of things at his NFL head-coaching job, the other was shown the door.
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The Washington Redskins finally handed head coach Jay Gruden the most clearly imminent pink slip in the league early Monday morning, ending Gruden’s six-season tenure in D.C. with an overall record of 35-49.
Naturally, Oakland Raiders coach Jon Gruden was going to be asked about his brother’s firing. His response was about what you’d expect.
From NFL.com:
"I'm obviously very disappointed for my brother," Gruden said Tuesday ahead of Oakland's bye week. "It was a long night, last couple of nights. He worked hard. Got a lot of respect for my brother. Obviously, I'm disappointed for him getting fired.
"But my dad's been fired. I've been fired. Jay's been fired and welcome to the club, bro."
The elder Gruden brother got his firing experience from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in January 2009 after failing to make the playoffs. Their father Jim Gruden was never an NFL head coach, but he was fired from a scouting position by the Bucs as well in 1987.
Of course, football coaches being fired isn’t isolated to the Gruden family. It’s almost an eventuality in that line of work.
Jon Gruden later turned getting fired into a personal brand, opening the Fired Football Coaches Association, an organization dedicated to analyzing tape with other coaches.
That probably won’t be the direction Jay takes in free agency, as he could be in the running for a number of jobs thanks to plenty of connections in the coaching community and a fairly strong record as far as fired coaches go.
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