The 4 types of NFL coaches on the hot seat
These coaches need to finish the season on a strong note — or, in Matt Nagy's case, on a miracle — to save their jobs. Plus, we make our pick for Steelers-Vikings on Thursday night.
If you’re a fan of college football, then you know how wild, sometimes heartwarming, and mostly unsavory the coaching carousel has been in the last couple weeks. It’s basically like that Mr. Cooger scene from Something Wicked This Way Comes: out of control and rapidly aging everyone riding it.
The NFL’s version should be much more boring than that … and that’s even accounting for the fact that the one coach who has already been dumped was ousted for using racist, sexist, and homophobic language in his emails. And he’s suing the league and commissioner Roger Goodell!
Although there’s only one head coach opening right now, that will change once we get closer to Black Monday. It’s too soon to know how many coaches will get the ax this year, but we can probably ballpark it in the 5-7 range. Last year, seven coaches were fired and the year before, that number was five.
For now, there is pretty much only one other position we can guarantee will be available. The rest will depend on how certain teams finish out the 2021 season. Let’s take a look at the coaches on the hot seat, how they got there, and what they can do to save their job.
First-year busts: David Culley, Urban Meyer
It’s not all that common for a franchise to get rid of a coach after just one season, but it does happen. Most recently, Steve Wilks and Freddie Kitchens were one-and-dones in Arizona and Cleveland, respectively. Before them, the list includes some familiar names who were either better off as coordinators or in college, plus Marty Schottenhemier and Pete Carroll.
This year’s crop of first-year coaches have gotten mixed results. Brandon Staley has the Chargers in the playoff hunt. Nick Sirianni’s Eagles aren’t out of it yet, either, and have almost reached the total number of wins that Vegas projected them to have all season. And while the Falcons are still pretty Falcon-y, Arthur Smith has already led them to more wins this year than they had in 2020.
Robert Saleh and Dan Campbell haven’t had much to celebrate on the field, but they haven’t been working with loaded rosters. The Jets’ and Lions’ talent deficit is so bad that everyone knew they’d be picking near the top of the draft again in 2022. Team ownership will be patient with both and see what they can do with more help, especially because it’s clear that their players love playing for these guys.
I don’t know if we can say the same for David Culley or Urban Meyer. Yes, both the Texans and Jaguars were supposed to be among the worst teams in the league, but these first-time NFL head coaches look out of their depth even as we enter Week 14.
Here’s Culley, not understanding why his veteran quarterback has been struggling:
I dunno, it could be because Tyrod Taylor has been injured, has almost no protection, and has to try to guide the NFL’s last-place-in-every-metric offense.
And here’s Meyer, clueless about how his young running back was being used in a blowout loss to the Rams:
James Robinson was also confused about when he was playing and why, and feels like he’s been benched. Not great, considering he’s one of the only playmakers on the entire team and probably their best offensive player right now. And Trevor Lawrence agrees!
Just last month, the Texans and Jags each notched a victory over a likely playoff-bound team (Houston upset Tennessee and Jacksonville beat Buffalo). Since then, neither has shown any signs of building off that win. They’re both fresh off a 30+ point loss and have two of the worst point differentials: -159 for the Texans, -140 for the Jags. But at least one of them is almost guaranteed, barring a tie, of winning one more game this season because they meet again in Week 15.
What can save them: The Texans are the only team officially eliminated from the postseason, while the Jaguars have a less than .01 percent chance of making it. So an improbable playoff push isn’t happening, but if one or both of them can simply play competitive football again and look like a functional NFL team, then that might be all it takes for Culley and Meyer to stick around.
That’s because they both work for dysfunctional organizations whose ownership will try to save face after everyone ridiculed these hirings in the first place. Texans GM Nick Caserio wouldn’t commit to Culley for 2022, but who knows how much he has a say in that decision anyway. And Shad Khan voiced his support for Meyer earlier this season when Meyer’s personal life and questionable decision-making dominated the news cycle.
Still, no one wants to be the laughingstock of the NFL. If neither team can offer any promise that it’s improving in the last month of the season, expect more turnover in the AFC South.
Second-year stumblers: Joe Judge, Matt Rhule
Only two offensive coordinators have been fired so far this year — perhaps, in part, an attempt for those head coaches to save their own job.
The Giants fired OC Jason Garrett after a Week 11 loss, and the Panthers followed suit the next week when they let Joe Brady go. Both offenses rank among the five worst in the NFL but have also been hit hard by injury.
The Giants, even after adding several big names in free agency, have been worse than they were in Joe Judge’s first year, when they were an Eagles tank job away from winning the NFC East. All of their four wins in 2021 have been against quality opponents — vs. the Saints, Panthers, Raiders, and Eagles — but most of their losses haven’t been close. And much too often, they don’t play disciplined football, which is supposed to be Judge’s specialty.
As Peter King wrote earlier this week:
Late in the third quarter at Miami on Sunday, the Giants had the ball and this happened, in succession:
QB Mike Glennon took a 13-yard sack.
Giants took a timeout to avoid a delay-of-game penalty.
Glennon took a seven-yard sack.
Giants took a delay-of-game penalty.
Now it was third-and-33. The Giants called a run. Gain of 13.
That cannot happen in an NFL game. And it happened in Judge’s 28th. It’s stunning that it would happen under a no-nonsense fundamentals-preacher like Judge.
Meanwhile, the Panthers have been all over the place this season. Early on, Matt Rhule had many of us ready to eat crow when Sam Darnold, whom he traded three draft picks for in the offseason, reeled off three straight wins to start the season. Then we put our forks down when Darnold and the Panthers fell back to Earth and dropped four straight. Darnold won just one more game as the starter — against the Falcons — before going on IR.
The much celebrated signing of Cam Newton after that looked like it was going to pay off when the Panthers’ one-time Superman helped them take down the NFC-leading Cardinals. Then Newton also came crashing back to reality. The Panthers already have as many wins as they did last season, but with just a 7 percent chance of making the playoffs and two games left against the division-leading Bucs, any hope they have is quickly dissipating.
What can save them: Honestly, Judge will probably be spared while GM Dave Gettleman is the one who gets fired (deservedly so). But if the Giants lose out and/or don’t show any progress heading into the new year, ownership might decide it’s time to clean house. If they just win every other week like they have been lately, then Judge won’t have anything to worry about.
Rhule is in a similar boat. The Athletic’s Joseph Person, a longtime Panthers beat writer, said his impression is Rhule will still be the coach in 2022. Perhaps Rhule could point to Kliff Kingsbury, another former college coach who didn’t really find his groove in the NFL until year three, as an example of who he can be.
But Rhule doesn’t have a Kyler Murray at quarterback, and Panthers owner David Tepper is known for two things: his brass balls and his lack of patience. Rhule made a big move by firing Brady with five games left in the season because they disagreed on offensive philosophy. Carolina’s offense needs to get back on track like Rhule thinks it can, or else Rhule might be joining Brady on the unemployment line.
One-time offensive gurus who have lost their juice: Matt Nagy, Kyle Shanahan
Matt Nagy is, like, 99.9 percent gonna get fired. We knew going into the year that the Bears needed to have a successful season for Nagy to last beyond 2021 — and I don’t mean successful like in 2018 and 2020, when they rode a strong defense and a weak schedule to a playoff bid. The Bears need to show life, especially on offense and especially at the quarterback position, which had been Nagy’s area of expertise pre-Chicago.
But somehow, through five different starting quarterbacks in his Bears tenure, Nagy hasn’t made any of them look like Patrick Mahomes, his QB from his time as Kansas City’s offensive coordinator. OK, so we shouldn’t expect Nagy to perform miracles, but at the very least we should see some positive development from these quarterbacks … and we haven’t. This year, Andy Dalton has been exactly what you’d expect him to be. Rookie Justin Fields has taken his share of lumps and has also flashed at times — just not enough to believe he’s in good hands with Nagy.
Kyle Shanahan has more job security than Nagy, though you couldn’t tell that by looking at him:
Shanahan, after nine seasons as an NFL offensive coordinator, got the Niners’ head coaching gig in 2017. Since then, they’ve only had one winning season: in 2019, when they were one quarter away from being crowned Super Bowl champs.
Shanahan’s seat got really hot in Week 9 after a double-digit loss to the Cardinals, who did not have Kyler Murry and DeAndre Hopkins in the lineup. Then the 49ers put together a three-game winning streak, which ended against another NFC West team, Seattle. In fact, half of the Seahawks’ four wins have come against the 49ers this year.
The 49ers, who normally have an efficient offense, struggled to get their run game going. In turn, the offense was forced to rely more on Jimmy Garoppolo; he was picked off twice and couldn’t get them in the end zone despite facing a first-and-goal at the Seattle 7 late in the game. Shanahan, who hasn’t been entirely forthcoming about some of his personnel decisions this season, was forced to explain why he didn’t put rookie Trey Lance in on a red zone package. Lance, the young quarterback the 49ers traded up to draft, started one game for an injured Garoppolo but has seen the field just once since, in garbage time against the Jaguars.
What can save them: At this point, Nagy would have to perform a miracle to save his job. Like, not only would the Bears have to go on a tear and make a playoff run, but Fields would have to come back from his ribs injury and play like he did against Clemson for the rest of the year.
Shanahan just needs to get the 49ers in the playoffs, and he should be fine. After all, the 49ers invested a lot of draft capital into Lance, with the idea that Shanahan would develop him into their franchise quarterback.
The good news is that they’re currently in the playoff picture as the No. 7 seed in the NFC. The bad news is that at 6-6, their hold on that final wild card spot is tenuous and any slipup could cost them a postseason berth.
Veteran defensive-minded coaches who are running out of time: Mike Zimmer, Vic Fangio
Mike Zimmer was already under a ton of pressure heading into this year. If the Vikings didn’t have a great season, culminating with a playoff spot and perhaps the NFC North title, then Zimmer would likely be out at the end.
Welllll, Zimmer’s team just lost to the previous winless Lions, thanks in no small part to his prevent defense decisions (three-man rush??) during Detroit’s comeback drive. It was the Vikings’ seventh loss of the season, all of which have been decided by one score.
Zimmer’s in his eighth season with the Vikings. They’ve been to the playoffs three times and have two postseason wins to show for it — somehow, both involved breaking the Saints’ hearts. Kirk Cousins is fine but not the kind of quarterback who can rally his team. The defense, Zimmer’s specialty, has been mediocre at best and underachieving at worst. And despite a win over the Packers just a few weeks ago, the Vikings haven’t threatened Green Bay’s dominance in the division.
Like Zimmer, Vic Fangio was a longtime defensive coordinator who finally got a chance to become a head coach when the Broncos hired him three years ago. But so far, the results on the field haven’t changed since Denver’s Super Bowl run in 2015: no playoff appearances and, not coincidentally, uninspiring quarterback play.
Fangio has yet to put together a winning season in Denver. Right now, the Broncos are 6-6 but don’t look particularly capable of reaching enough wins to make it to the playoffs (FiveThirtyEight gives them a 17 percent chance). The defense doesn’t give up a ton of points but ranks No. 20 in DVOA. The offense isn’t consistent enough or potent enough to reliably win games, particularly in the AFC West. And after the Broncos’ 12 straight loss to the Chiefs, time could be running out for Fangio.
What can save them: Zimmer’s Vikings have to finish out the season strong. They don’t just need to make the playoffs, either. They probably need to win a game or two in the postseason, or else Minnesota will be on the prowl for a new, perhaps offensive-minded, head coach.
The Broncos need to play with a sense of urgency in these last five weeks. If they miss out on the playoffs but look like a team headed in the right direction, Fangio might get another chance to prove he has what it takes to be a head coach … especially if the Broncos can finally figure out a solution at quarterback this offseason.
Thursday Night Football pick: Steelers vs. Vikings
This week’s Thursday night matchup pits two teams on the cusp of the playoff picture against each other. The 5-7 Vikings, licking their wounds after a last-season loss to the Lions, will host the 6-5-1 Steelers, coming off a last-season win over the Ravens.
The Vikings need a victory more, not only to try to save Mike Zimmer’s job but to also move on from the humiliation in Detroit. But the Steelers don’t have any easy matchups left on their schedule, and shouldn’t let any winnable games slip through their fingers. Then again, how much can we trust that 39-going-on-59 Ben Roethlisberger will be fresh enough on such a short week?
Both teams seem fated to finish with eight wins, and since the Vikings have a little ground to make up in the win column, and have extra motivation to play with, we’ll give them the nod this week.