According to Cody Benjamin of bleed-green.com, Ashley Zavala of the NBC affiliate KOMU-TV, and former Eagles fullback Kyle Eckel, Gruden is in Philadelphia right now and his representatives have told a few people that he is indeed in town to accept the job as the Eagles newest head coach.
Benjamin and Zavala also note that Reid is stepping down due to off-field issues and that this deal got done during the Super Bowl. Neither would speculate as to what the off-field issues are, but one would guess it would have something to do with his troublesome sons should this story pan out.
There are also rumors now circulating that Reid is not stepping down as much as he is "stepping up" into a front office role a la Mike Holmgren.
To me, this sounds like someone thought up a rumor that made some sense and ran with it. Crazier things have happened, but it's a bit odd that none of the major news-breakers have even addressed this.
Adam Schefter, Chris Mortenson, Jason La Canfora, Adam Caplan, Jay Glazer -- all silent.
Maybe they're sleeping as this is all happening at about 1:30 in the morning, but I'm thinking they would wake up for a story as big as this would be.
There's just too much about this that doesn't make any sense. Had something happened with his kids, it likely would have made the news. And I can't imagine what else would be big enough to make him step down after 12 years as head coach and hand the reigns over to someone else.
Then there's the fact that the Eagles would have to satisfy the Rooney Rule before Gruden could even accept the job, and there's no way they went through that process already.
I'm sure there will be more to report as we hit Monday afternoon, but I'm betting the only thing to report is that this is absolutely bogus and we all wasted our time talking about it.
Or, you know, maybe not.
UPDATE: As we all expected, this is has been shot down. Adam Schefter said via Twitter that three different people told him this was "ridiculous," it was "impossible," and just flat-out "no."
But Reuben Frank of CSNPhilly.com might have summed this whole thing up best:
"Enough of the Gruden nonsense. It's not true. Its not even a report. It's not even a wrong story. It's social media hysteria. OK, carry on."
