Before Kyle Shanahan and Sean McVay (and after Gary Kubiak), Jeremy Bates might have been the next great offensive wunderkind to come out of the Shanahan tree. In 2008, Mike Shanahan allowed the then 32 year old to call plays for the Broncos. Here's what Mike Shanahan said about him:
“Jeremy was a guy that was ahead of his time,” Shanahan told the Daily News on Monday. “He’s an extremely bright guy. That’s one of the reasons why he called plays. I knew he could handle it. When you’re around coaches, you know who has the ability to call plays and who doesn’t. And it doesn’t take you long to figure it out… especially when you’ve called plays your whole life. Which people understand defenses? Which people understand the running game? Which people understand how the running game and play action are put together? Which people understand third downs?”
and later in the same article,
“To be a good play caller, you really have to understand defenses,” Shanahan said. “You have to be a student of the game. You have to know defenses better than defensive coaches do. So, when you’re on the offensive side of the ball, you have to know fronts, you have to know secondary coverages, linebacker drops, different stunts. You have to really know it all to be a really effective guy. Sometimes guys get better with age too. There’s a learning process. It’s like playing a game of chess. The more you play it, the better you get it. But you better be studying it all the time.”
The thing is, Jeremy Bates never succeeded as an NFL OC--and he had two chances to do so. He was Pete Carroll's first OC with the Seahawks and only lasted one year before Carroll fired him. He was then given a second shot with the Jets in 2018 (Mike Shanahan's comments above come from an interview before the 2018 season.), under Todd Bowles. I should add that Rick Dennison was also coaching with Bates at that time (as well as Karl Dorrell, who coached with Mike Shanahan). About the three Mike Shanahan said,
"I’m sure Jeremy and Rick will incorporate some of those points. Rick Dennison is one of the brightest guys you’ll ever meet. Jeremy is the same way. I know Karl DorrelI know quite well too. So, you got three excellent coaches that I know personally. I think you guys will be very impressed with what your offense looks like this year."
From my understanding the 2018 Jets offense was bad. To be fair, their roster may not have been great, but I don't think that completely explains the failure. (By the way, this was Sam Darnold's first year. Jason Myers was also the kicker.)
So what went wrong? Unfortunately, I don't really know, although I did a cursory search to try to answer this. The only two bits of information I got, that point to possible reasons for failure, were the following: 1) Bates was difficult to work with because he was demanding. (Shanahan mentions this in the article.); 2) Bates was too arrogant. (Shaun King, TB QB, said, "Bates 'had that cocky, I-know-more-than-you attitude. We would give him a hard time about that.'") Could these things cause a coach to fail? Yes, I think so, but I don't know if they explain why he failed.
How does this relate to Brian Fleury, the Seahawks new OC? Honestly, I don't know that it does, but Mike Shanahan's comments about the qualities of a good play caller are interesting to me. At the same time, when he talks about Bates being really intelligent, I've heard the same type of comments about Fleury. I will also say that I recently listened to an interview with Matt Hasselbeck on Wyman and Bob Show, and he mentioned "humility" as one of Fleury's positive traits. If Bates failed because he was a know-it-all, I get some comfort knowing that Fleury doesn't seem to have this problem.