Kraft quickly wants HC hire; 'feel terrible' for Mayo

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft said he plans to move quickly to hire a head coach, while also addressing the decision to fire Jerod Mayo after just one season.

“This whole situation is on me,” Kraft said Monday. “I feel terrible for Jerod, because I put him in an untenable situation. I know that he has all the tools as a head coach to be successful in this league. He just needed more time before taking the job.

“In the end, I’m a fan of this team first, and now I have to go out and find a coach who can get us back to the playoffs and hopefully championships.”

The Patriots, who were 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 that we’ve heard about. I’d rather respond to that after I’ve seen everyone,” Kraft said. “We want to interview as many people as we can that we think can help us get to that position that we want to be in.”

Kraft said his son, team president Jonathan Kraft, will be involved 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 be staying on” as the Patriots are “looking for people working together.” But he also acknowledged the hiring of a new coach could potentially alter internal dynamics because the coach will “obviously have big input on who the players are, and who the coaches are — it will be his decision.”

Of the decision to fire Mayo, Kraft said he “went back and forth” over the last month. He described a Week 1 win at Cincinnati as his high point of the season, but “midseason, 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 23-16 — a result that bumped them from the No. 1 pick in the NFL draft to the No. 4 spot.

“He was a man,” Kraft said of his conversation with Mayo after the game. “Look, it was one of the more difficult things I’ve had to do in my life because I had such affection for him. And I believe in him. I really do believe as he gets more experience, he’ll be successful. He was a gentleman and accepted it that way.”

Kraft acknowledged that negative fan reaction in recent weeks, which included chants in the team’s home stadium to fire Mayo, had an impact in his decision.

“We don’t own this team; it’s owned by the fans of this region,” Kraft said. “We’re custodians of a very special asset of the community. That helps me try to make decisions. That if it was just personal, it would be different.”