One odd fragment of Josh McDaniels leaving Indianapolis in the lurch was the revelation that the offensive coordinator shared an agent, Bob LaMonte, with Colts GM Chris Ballard.
Shared. Past tense.
LaMonte confirmed to NFL Network's Mike Garafolo that he terminated his relationship with McDaniels. ESPN first reported the split.
"My word is my bond. Once you break that, there's nothing left," LaMonte told Garafolo.
Earlier in the day, Garafolo reported that LaMonte advised McDaniels that he was making perhaps the biggest professional mistake of his career by backing out of the Colts deal so late in the process.
Parting ways with McDaniels was the next step for LaMonte, despite the agent potentially losing out on the commission of McDaniels' new contract with New England.
LaMonte works for many NFL coaches, assistants and executives, including Jon Gruden, Doug Pederson, Andy Reid, Howie Roseman, Rick Spielman, Tom Telesco and a boatload of others. Two assistant coaching candidates for the now-open Colts' coaching gig, Frank Reich and Leslie Frazier, are also repped by LaMonte.
It's fair to question the conflict of interest that could arise from an agent representing both sides of a prospective deal, though LaMonte told Garafolo that McDaniels' actions made it "not an issue of conflict of interest. It's conflict of principles."
In this case, it didn't work out for Ballard and McDaniels. Now the latter will need a new agent.
