NFL Head Coaches Archives - Head Coach Ranking

Experienced Head Coaches: Does Your Team Need One?

By Juan Lozano | June 25, 2020

We generally start seeing the coaching carousel rotate at full speed late in the NFL season. Disappointed fan bases are eager to move on from their team’s current head coach in favor of another head coach with a different approach or skill set.

The pool of head coaching candidates mentioned is generally limited to popular coordinators that are on playoff -bound teams or that play an exciting style of football. Certainly there’s benefit to hiring a head coach with a good scheme. However, the head football coaching career graveyard is full of headstones of those coaches that had a great scheme. Great scheme isn’t enough to sustain success in the NFL.

NFL head coaches have a difficult time managing a team all by themselves. They need help from members of their coaching staff. Head coaches need to demonstrate leadership qualities but also hire coaches that also possess those qualities. We think there is benefit in hiring a head coach or an assistant coach that has head coaching experience.

We decided to take a look at NFL assistant coaches with either college or pro (outdoor football) head coaching experience on a coaching staff. We think there is some value in having a former head coach on staff that knows how to deal with difficult situations, if not chaotic organizations.

Consider that two of the longer tenured NFL head coaches, the Patriots’ Bill Belichick and Seattle’s Pete Carroll started their NFL head coaching careers in chaotic organizations. Belichick coached the Cleveland Browns from 1991-1995 and Carroll was the Jets head coach in 1994. Winning games was a challenge. Bill Belichick’s Browns winning percentage was .450 while Pete Carroll went 6-10 in his lone season as Jets head coach.

Both Belichick and Carroll recovered from their first NFL head coaching experience to not only get additional head coaching opportunities but win Super Bowls.

Three of the five head coaches (Mike McCarthy, Matt Rhule, Ron Rivera). hired after the 2019 season were previously head coaches. More frequently NFL teams with vacancies have hired coaches without head coaching experience. If that trend continues, then young head coaches would be wise to look at coaches with prior head coaching experience to help them learn to be head coaches.

We decided to take a look at NFL teams that have former head coaches on the coaching staff. As part of our methodology, we did not include coaches that were named an interim but had not been ever named a head coach. (Example: Dan Campbell, current Saints tight ends coach who took over when the Dolphins fired Joe Philbin). But we did include a coach’s interim record if he was ever named a full-time head coach.

The overwhelming majority of those coaches named on this list won’t receive another head coaching opportunity because of the decision maker desire to hire newer coaching talent. However, some of these coaches deserve a closer look by teams and even new head coaches that are looking for experienced leadership.

In this list below, there are a few interesting takeaways:

Super Bowl coaches: There are two coaches that participated in Super Bowls as head coaches: Cleveland OL coach Bill Callahan and Minnesota OC Gary Kubiak.
Professional outdoor leagues (not NFL): Some coaches received head coaching experience in outdoor leagues, not the NFL. Here is a list of those coaches: Barrett (CFL), Gailey(WLAF), Hamilton (XFL), Gruden(UFL), Haslett (UFL), Tomsula (NFL Europe)
Black coaches: We identified these black coaches that are former head coaches. They are in bold.They are: Vance Joseph, Raheem Morris, Leslie Frazier, Stump Mitchell, Romeo Crennel, Danny Barrett, Pep Hamilton, Andre Patterson, Curtis Johnson, Jon Embree, Todd Bowles. Only Joseph, Morris, and Bowles are current coordinators. Only Barrett, Hamilton, Mitchell, Johnson, and Embree are offensive coaches. Only Pep Hamilton coaches quarterbacks.
Coaching Alumni: There are some teams that have a number of former head coaches in the league.
- Carolina: Capers and Rivera
- Houston: Capers and Kubiak – Both are on the same staff in Minnesota. Kubiak replaced Capers in Houston.
- Cleveland: Crennel, Kitchens, Shurmur
- Jacksonville: Bradley, Del Rio
- Detroit: Marinelli, Mornhinweg, Schwartz- Both Mornhinweg and Schwartz are on the Eagles staff.
- Oakland: Allen, Cable, Callahan, Del Rio
- Tampa Bay: Koetter and Morris

’20 TEAM	NAME	TITLE	HC TEAM	YEAR	WIN %

AZ	Joseph, Vance	DC	Denver (NFL)	2017-2018	0.344
AZ	Kugler, Sean	OL	UTEP (NCAA)	2013-2017	0.333

ATL	Brock, Dave	WR	Delaware (NCAA)	2013-2016	0.463
ATL	Koetter, Dirk	OC	Boise State (NCAA)	1998-2000	0.722
			Arizona St. (NCAA)	2001-2006	0.541
			Tampa Bay (NFL)	2016-2018	0.396
ATL	Morris, Raheem	DC	Tampa Bay (NFL)	2009-2011	0.354
ATL	Sutton, Bob	Def. Analyst	Army (NCAA)	1991-1999	0.44

BUF	Babich, Bob	LB	North Dakota St. (NCAA)	1997-2002	0.676
BUF	Boras, Rob	TE	Benedictine (NCAA)	1998	0.3
BUF	Frazier, Leslie	DC	Minnesota (NFL)	2010-2013	0.398

CAR	Foley, Ed	Ass’t ST	Fordham (NCAA)	2004-2005	0.227

CIN	Duffner, Mark	Sr. Def Ass’t	Holy Cross (NCAA)	1986-1991	0.909
			Maryland (NCAA)	1992-1996	0.364
CIN	Golden, Al	LB	Temple (NCAA)	2006-2010	0.443
			Miami (FL)	2011-2015	0.561

CHI	Pagano, Chuck	DC	Indianapolis (NFL)	2012-2017	0.552

CLE	Callahan, Bill	OL	Oakland (NFL)	2002-2003	0.469
			Nebraska (NCAA)	2004-2007	0.551
			Washington (NFL)	2019	0.273
CLE	Mitchell, Stump	RB	Morgan St. (NCAA)	1996-1998	0.25
			Southern (NCAA)	2010-2012	0.273
	Philbin, Joe	OL	Miami (NFL)	2012-2015	0.462
			Green Bay (NFL)	2018	0.5
	Tomsula, Jim	DL	Rhein (NFL Europe )	2006	0.6
			San Francisco (NFL)	20102015	0.353

DEN	Munchak, Mike	OL	Tennessee (NFL)	2011-2013	0.458
	Shula, Mike	QB	Alabama (NCAA)	2003-2006	0.531
	Shurmur, Pat	OC	Cleveland (NFL)	2011-2012	0.281
			Philadelphia (NFL)	2015	1
			NY Giants (NFL)	2018-2019	0.281

GB	Pettine, Mike	DC	Green Bay (NFL)	2014-2015	0.313

HOU	Crennel, Romeo	Associate HC	Cleveland (NFL)	2006-2008	0.375
			Kansas City (NFL)	2011-2012	0.211
	Barrett, Danny	RB	Saskatchewan (CFL)	2000-2006	0.456
			UCF (NCAA)	2015	0

JAX	Gruden, Jay	OC	Florida (UFL)	2010	0.625
			Washington (NFL)	2014-2019	0.418
JAX	McAdoo, Ben	QB	NY Giants (NFL)	2016-2017	0.464

KC	Spagnuolo, Steve	DC	St. Louis (NFL)	2009-2011	0.208
			NY Giants (NFL)	2017	0.212

LV	Cable, Tom	OL	Idaho (NCAA)	2000-2003	0.239
			Oakland (NFL)	2008-2010	0.386
	Guenther, Paul	DC	Ursinus College (NCAA)	1997-2000	0.581
	Marinelli, Rod	DL	Detroit (NFL)	2006-2008	0.208

LAC	Bradley, Gus	DC	Jacksonville (NFL)	2013-2016	0.226
	Hamilton, Pep	QB	D.C. Defenders (XFL)	2020	0.6
	Scherer, Rip	SR. Consult.	James Madison (NCAA)	1991-1994	0.604
			Memphis (NCAA)	1995-2000	0.333

LAR	Bonamego, John	STC	Central Michigan(NCAA)	2015-2018	0.431

MIA	Gailey, Chan	OC	Troy (NCAA)	1983-1984	0.792
			Birmingham (WLAF)	1991-1992	0.6
			Samford (NCAA)	1993	0.455
			Georgia Tech (NCAA)	2002-2007	0.579
			Dallas (NFL)	1998-1999	0.563
			Buffalo (NFL)	2010-2012	0.425

MIN	Capers, Dom	Def. Spec. Ass’t	Carolina (NFL)	1995-1998	0.468
			Houston (NFL)	2002-2005	0.281
MIN	Kubiak, Gary	OC	Houston (NFL)	2006-2013	0.488
			Denver (NFL)	2015-2016	0.656
MIN	Patterson, Andre	Co-DC	Cal Poly (NCAA)	1994-1996	0.515

NO	Allen, Dennis	DC	Oakland (NFL)	2012-2014	0.222
	Johnson, Curtis	Sr. Off. Ass’t	Tulane (NCAA)	2011-2015	0.204
	Rizzi, Darren	STC	New Haven (NCAA)	1999-2001	0.517
			Rhode Island (NCAA)	2008	0.25

NYG	Bielema, Bret	OLB	Wisconsin(NCAA)	2006-2012	0.739
NYG	Bielema, Bret		Arkansas (NCAA)	2013-2017	0.46
NYG	Dooley, Derek	Sr. Off. Ass’t	LA Tech (NCAA)	2007-2009	0.459
NYG	Dooley, Derek		Tennessee (NCAA)	2010-2012	0.417
	Garrett, Jason	OC	Dallas (NFL)	2010-2019	0.559
	Kitchens, Freddie	TE	Cleveland (NFL)	2019	0.375

NYJ	Williams, Gregg	DC	Buffalo (NFL)	2001-2003	0.354
		DC	Cleveland (NFL)	2008	0.625

PHI	Briner, Andrew	PG Analyst	Fordham (NCAA)	2016-2017	0.545
	Mornhinweg, Marty	Sr. Off. Cons.	Detroit (NFL)	2001-2022	0.156
	Pannunzio, Joe	Team Dev.	Murray St. (NCAA)	2000-2005	0.448
	Schwartz, Jim	DC	Detroit (NFL)	2009-2013	0.363

SF	Embree, Jon	TE	Colorado (NCAA)	2011-2012	0.16

TB	Bowles, Todd	Def. Coord.	Miami (NFL)	2011	0.667
			NY Jets (NFL)	2015-2018	0.375
	Christophel, Rick	TE	Austin Peay (NCAA)	2007-2012	0.303

TEN	Haslett, Jim	ILB	New Orleans (NFL)	2000-2005	0.469
			St. Louis (NFL)	2008	0.167
			Florida Tuskers (UFL)	2009	0.857

WAS	Del Rio, Jack	DC	Jacksonville (NFL)	2003-2011	0.489
			Oakland (NFL)	2015-2017	0.521

If & When The NFL Season Starts, Will We See Defenses Far Ahead Of Offenses? And Does This Affect Gaming Lines?

By HCR Staff | May 20, 2020

Preparing an NFL team for a season requires orchestration of a lot of moving parts, and for every NFL head coach, a lot of those parts and brand new – and untested – every year.

And when the schedule in the traditional preparation months gets disrupted, the efficacy of the team will get disrupted as well.

In this scenario, the general belief among the industry is that the defense will be ahead of the offense – i.e., offenses will look out of rhythm and simply won’t be as productive in the earlier part of the season.

Offenses rely just a bit more on synchronicity, and in order to have great synchronicity among the offensive players, they have to have familiarity and time together. But if they don’t get that time together, it’s presumed there will be less synchronicity, greater confusion, and all of this results in poor play.

Will this proposition hold for the projected 2020 NFL season?

If, for some reason, the NFL season starts on time, we firmly believe defenses will be ‘ahead’ of offenses. There may be a few offenses that’ll thrive, but that’s contingent on how many new players they have to integrate – the fewer the better.

If the NFL season begins in mid-October, however, the risk of offenses being behind defenses is minimized. In this scenario, teams may not get preseason games to use to fine tune performance, but they may get extended camp time to work together.

Does Vegas factor this into their propositions? We think it should. If the season starts on time, we’d favor Under more frequently than the Over.

So as you get ready to prepare for your NFL gaming choices, keep an eye on the start date of the season. That’s a key number to consider.

It’s A Bad Look: NFL Head Coaches Using Stats & Numbers To Justify Decisions

By HCR Staff | May 19, 2020

The discussion on how numbers should be utilized in understanding performance will be never-ending. There are those who can’t tell if a performance was good or bad without first consulting the numbers, and then there are those who simply use their eyes and understanding of the game.

Here at HCR, we’re in the latter camp – even though our algorithm results in a number.

One strong opinion we do have when it comes to numbers: it’s always a bad look whenever an NFL head coach starts using stats or numbers to justify a decision.

Presumably, NFL head coaches are paid many millions of dollars a year in salary because a) they have a deep understanding of the game of football; b) they have well-trained eyes for football; and c) they can tie a & b together to derive a reasonable conclusion and path forward to creating a winning team.

Basically, in our view, every NFL head coach should have an effective combination of gut feel, experience, and judgment. They should, rarely, ever use numbers to justify a decision.

But when they do, that’s a red flag to us. It’s an indication that they’re second-guessing a decision – at least to some material extent.

One case in point is Jon Gruden and the Raiders’ first round selection in this year’s draft, Ohio St. cornerback Damon Arnette. Selected No. 19 overall, some observers are calling his selection a reach.

Gruden, in speaking with the Mercury News this week, defended the pick, and in doing so, brought up Arnette’s rating by ProFootballFocus.

ProFootballFocus?

No knock against PFF, but Jon Gruden is a Super Bowl-winning head coach and his GM is a former college and NFL defensive back, Mike Mayock. Both were also former game analysts. They’ve seen a lot of football.

That’s 2 pairs of pretty experienced eyes to go along with the basic Combine measurements that every team gets.

Their evaluation also is bolstered by the opinion of the Raiders’ own scouts; pros who evaluate for a living.

If Gruden had to defend the selection, we would have guessed 10 times out of 10 that he simply would’ve said something like “look, that’s our evaluation. We think he’s a good football player, and that he’s going to help us win.”

By bringing up the PFF rating, Gruden looks defensive, and he makes the decision even more suspect. If PFF is going to be used in the selection process, then why not simply follow PFF’s rankings to the letter? There were more highly rated corners per PFF.

Keep it in mind. When you hear your head coach arguing stats or numbers, he’s showing insecurity about his decision-making. And that’s a red flag for game day.

HCR’S Head Coach Rankings & Rotoworld

By HCR Staff | May 18, 2020

While we’re still out here alone (as far as we know) in ranking head coaches against an algorithm, we’re still interested in how other respected sites take on the subject.

One of those sites is Rotoworld. Recently, they published their own ranking of NFL head coaches.

We don’t know the ins and outs of how they arrived at their rankings, but we thought it’d be interesting to compare our rankings – derived from our proprietary algorithm – to Rotoworld’s.

Keep in mind: HCR’s current ranking is based off performance in the 2019 regular season.

Here you go:

Team	Coach	HCR Grade	2019 HCR Ranking	2020 Rank	Rotoworld Rank
Baltimore Ravens	John Harbaugh	8.1	1	1	4
New Orleans Saints	Sean Payton	8.0	2	2	3
New England Patriots	Bill Belichick	7.9	3-T	3-T	1
San Francisco 49ers	Kyle Shanahan	7.9	3-T	3-T	8
Houston Texans	Bill O'Brien	7.4	5	5	17
Kansas City Chiefs	Andy Reid	7.3	6-T	6-T	2
Seattle Seahawks	Pete Carroll	7.3	6-T	6-T	9
Minnesota Vikings	Mike Zimmer	7.2	8-T	8-T	10
Tampa Bay Buccaneers	Bruce Arians	7.2	8-T	8-T	14
Tennessee Titans	Mike Vrabel	7.2	8-T	8-T	12
Indianapolis Colts	Frank Reich	7.1	11-T	11	13
Green Bay Packers	Matt LaFleur	7	13-T	12-T	15
Philadelphia Eagles	Doug Pederson	7	13-T	12-T	5
Los Angeles Rams	Sean McVay	7	13-T	12-T	7
Buffalo Bills	Sean McDermott	6.9	16-T	15-T	11
Las Vegas Raiders	Jon Gruden	6.9	16-T	15-T	19
Arizona Cardinals	Kliff Kingsbury	6.8	19-T	17-T	21
Detroit Lions	Matt Patricia	6.8	19-T	17-T	26
Miami Dolphins	Brian Flores	6.8	19-T	17-T	20
Pittsburgh Steelers	Mike Tomlin	6.7	22-T	20-T	6
Atlanta Falcons	Dan Quinn	6.7	22-T	20-T	23
Los Angeles Chargers	Anthony Lynn	6.7	22-T	20-T	18
Denver Broncos	Vic Fangio	6.6	25	23	22
Chicago Bears	Mayy Nagy	6.5	26-T	24-T	16
Cincinnati Bengals	Zac Taylor	6.5	26-T	24-T	24
Jacksonville Jaguars	Doug Marrone	6.5	26-T	24-T	27
New York Jets	Adam Gase	6.1	30-T	27	25
Dallas Cowboys	Mike McCarthy	NR	NR	NR	NR
Cleveland Browns	Kevin Stefanski	NR	NR	NR	NR
New York Giants	Joe Judge	NR	NR	NR	NR
Carolina Panthers	Matt Rhule	NR	NR	NR	NR
Washington Redskins	Ron Rivera	NR	NR	NR	NR

A few comparisons we found interesting:

Kyle Shanahan – We have him tied for 3^rd based on the 2019 regular season – one in which the 49ers played a brutal schedule – but Rotoworld has him 8^th in their rankings.

Bill O’Brien – Ranked 5^th with us – again, based off the 2019 regular season only – and 17^th with Rotoworld. O’Brien is one of the most polarizing head coaches out there.

Doug Pederson – Here’s one where Rotoworld ranked high at 5, and we have at 12.

Mike Tomlin – Finally, Rotoworld has Tomlin 6^th, and we have him 20^th – which is in the bottom 3^rd of the league. Again, Tomlin is one of the head coaches that generates a wide range of opinions.

We’ll keep an eye out for other rankings we’re interested in, especially from favored sites such as Rotoworld. NFL head coaches have more influence on game outcomes than their peers in other sports, so their relative talent and skill in judgment and decision-making matters.

And it’s something to factor into your betting and other gaming decisions.

COVID-19 Silver Lining For NFL Head Coaches: Innovation

By HCR Staff | May 11, 2020

Preparing a team for an NFL season is hard work. NFL head coaches are asked to put a product on the field that appears well-organized and fine-tuned.

This is easier said than done. Every off-season, head coaches have to integrate new pieces, players and coaches, and somehow bring it all together so it’s productive and competitive.

And due to the Collective Bargaining Agreement with the NFLPA, coaches have far less coaching time with the players than ever before.

Now, head coaches also have to plan around a pandemic.

NFL head coaches love routine. Routine presumably eliminates the possibility of distraction, and routine allows everyone in an organization to learn protocols, and to get comfortable with those protocols.

But due to COVID, the 2020 offseason ‘routine’ is no more.

Head coaches now are forced to re-think everything about how to prepare for a season. And that’s actually been a good thing.

Every protocol is being re-examined. How coaches spend their time is being analyzed. Efficiency has become paramount.

Based on anecdotal evidence, it appears that coaches are refreshed, and energized, by this new approach.

They’re getting more tech savvy; that’s a good thing, particularly so because it’s mandatory to connect to a new generation of players.

Coaches are getting physically refreshed. There’s a new acknowledgment that the long days during the offseason don’t have to be as long. That family and personal time also helps effectiveness.

Coaches also are learning new teaching techniques to address the lack of on-field time with players. Communication has to go beyond explaining concepts and technique to players during an in-person session with players.

The modern NFL coach is being challenged more than ever. It’s a good thing, in our view. And it’s going to lead to a fascinating season if it kicks off.

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