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Mike Reiss, ESPN writer
FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft said he plans to move quickly to hire a head coach as he addresses the decision to fire Jerod Mayo after just one season.
“This whole situation is on me,” Kraft said Monday. “I feel really bad for Jerod, because I put him in an untenable situation. I know he has all the tools as a head coach to be successful in this league. He just needed more time before accepting the job.
“In the end, I’m a fan of this team first, and now I have to go out and find a coach that can get us back to the playoffs and, hopefully, the championship.”
The Patriots, who went 4-13 under Mayo, have already submitted a request to speak with Detroit Lions offensive coordinator Ben Johnson, according to a source.
Kraft, 83, was also asked if former Patriots linebacker and former Tennessee head coach Mike Vrabel is near the top of his list.
“There are some wonderful people we’ve heard about. I prefer to answer that after I’ve seen them all,” Kraft said. “We want to interview as many people as we can who we think can help us get to the position we want to be in.”
Kraft said his son, team president Jonathan Kraft, will participate in the interview process along with senior personnel executive Alonzo Highsmith and executive vice president of player personnel Eliot Wolf.
Kraft said Highsmith and Wolf “will stay” as the Patriots are “looking for people who will work together.” But he also acknowledged that hiring a new coach could potentially alter the internal dynamic because the coach “will obviously have a lot of input into who the players are and who the coaches are; it will be his decision.”
Regarding the decision to fire Mayo, Kraft said he was “back and forth” over the past month. He described a Week 1 win at Cincinnati as his season highlight, but “midway through the season, I think we started to regress.”
Kraft said he didn’t inform Mayo of his decision until after Sunday’s season finale, when the Patriots defeated the Buffalo Bills 23-16, a result that moved them from the No. 1 pick in the NFL draft to No. 4. .
“He was a man,” Kraft said of his conversation with Mayo after the game. “Look, it was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do in my life because I was very fond of him. And I believe in him. I really believe that as he gains more experience, he will be successful. He was a gentleman and he accepted it that way.” .
Kraft acknowledged that negative fan reaction in recent weeks, which included chants at the team’s stadium to send off Mayo, had an impact on his decision.
“We don’t own this team; it’s owned by the fans of this region,” Kraft said. “We are custodians of a very special community asset. That helps me try to make decisions. If it were just personal, it would be different.”
