Grading every NFL head coach hired in 2017

As Black Monday came and went, there were five teams left with head coach vacancies. Now, all of those spots have been filled, and the new hires are hitting the ground running, preparing for the draft and free agency and planning the offseason.

This happens every single season, as teams move forward and bring in a new leader in hopes of turning things around. It worked out for some teams last season, like the New York Giants. After a 6-10 finish in 2015, the Giants moved on from longtime coach Tom Coughlin and hired offensive coordinator Ben McAdoo as the new head coach. This season, the Giants finished 11-5 and made the postseason.

Sometimes it doesn’t work out, as was the case in San Francisco with Chip Kelly. Kelly was fired by the Philadelphia Eagles toward the end of the 2015 season, and was snatched up by the San Francisco 49ers. The Niners finished this season with just two wins, and Kelly, along with general manager Trent Baalke, was ousted after the season.

The Buffalo Bills, Jacksonville Jaguars, Los Angeles Rams, San Diego Chargers, and 49ers were all in the market for new head coaches, and so far, the Bills, Broncos, and Jaguars have settled on a new coach.

The Jaguars parted ways with head coach Gus Bradley after he got Jacksonville off to a 2-12 start in 2016. Over three seasons, Bradley went 14-48 with the Jaguars, and it had become clear that he wasn’t the man to turn the team around.

Jacksonville put Doug Marrone, the team’s assistant head coach and offensive line coach, in charge on an interim basis. The Jaguars decided to hire Marrone as the team’s next head coach, which makes sense considering how the team performed under him as the interim. Jacksonville beat the Tennessee Titans in Week 16, breaking a nine-game losing streak, and in Week 16 they gave the Colts a fight, losing 24-20.

It’s impossible to judge the Jaguars’ move without mentioning that Tom Coughlin was hired to be president of football operations. Coughlin gets control of the roster, and incumbent general manager Dave Caldwell essentially gets moved into more of a talent evaluation role. During his stint as the Jaguars head coach, Coughlin was good at taking the personnel and molding the roster into a team. He also worked closely with Jerry Reese to help build two Super Bowl-winning Giants teams.

Taking together, the Marrone and Coughlin hirings would appear to send a signal that the Jaguars don’t need to start over entirely, which they don’t. This is a talented roster as it is. Marrone has underwhelmed some who expects a splashier candidate, but it’s a solid hire given his overall body of work.

Grade: B+

With the Dolphins out of the playoffs, the Broncos were able to move ahead with one of their main targets this offseason: Miami defensive coordinator Vance Joseph. The 44-year-old has never been a head coach before, spending most of his time in the NFL coaching defensive backs, and was only a DC for one season with the Dolphins. It’s a path that mirrors Mike Tomlin’s rise to coaching the Steelers — and led to him winning a Super Bowl in his first season with Pittsburgh.

The decision for Denver here makes sense with the Broncos’ commitment to defense. Joseph is unproven, but he’s not exactly walking into a rebuilding project here.

Some will point out Joseph’s only season with the Dolphins didn’t result in huge upticks on the stat sheet. They were 29th in yards allowed and 30th in rushing yards allowed. However, it’s difficult for a coach to put his imprint on a defense in just one season. The fact that the Dolphins proved to be resilient enough to play their way into the playoffs this season, after so many dismal years, speaks well of his work there under rookie head coach Adam Gase.

Remember, it was Denver’s offense that was the team’s biggest problem this season. Keep an eye on who he hired to be his offensive coordinator. Former Chargers head coach Mike McCoy will get that job, one he’s had before from 2010 through 2012.

Grade: A

McDermott has a well-earned reputation for being a coach who values relationships, between himself and the players and among the players themselves. It’s sounds like a new-agey way of calling him a players’ coach, but mostly what it means is that he’s a defensive coordinator who puts his players in the best position to succeed.

Unlike Rex Ryan and his brother Rob, who insisted that players conform to their system, McDermott builds a game plan based on his players. What a revolutionary concept.

He’s the antithesis of Rex Ryan.

Recognizing that you win football games with “Jimmys and Joes not Xs and Os” is a big step forward for getting the Bills back to the playoffs, a promise Ryan made but couldn’t deliver. But it will take more than putting players in position to succeed. McDermott takes over a team with serious questions about who calls the shots in the front office and how that translates to the product on the field. Just look at the team’s handling of the Tyrod Taylor situation in the final week of the season, benching him for financial reasons without actually making the head coach a part of that decision.

Weirdly enough, the offense was working fine in Buffalo under OC and interim coach Anthony Lynn. McDermott’s success will in part hinge on who he picks to run the offense, and the team’s decision about Taylor’s future as the starting quarterback there.

Grade: A-

Rams hire Sean McVay

McVay doesn’t turn 31 until later this month, making him the youngest head coach in NFL history. In and of itself, that doesn’t mean a whole lot. Having some of your youth left is probably an asset given the demands a head coaching job puts on your health.

The real question for McVay, like McDermott and Joseph, is whether or not he can take the success he had as a coordinator and translate that into running an entire team, a team not exactly known for its functionality.

For now, this move looks like a win for turning around the woeful Rams offense, which is where McVay earned his reputation in Washington. He inherits a second-year quarterback who the jury’s still out on, a guy who could be a special kind of running back ... and not much else to build an offense with and no top draft picks in 2017 to do bring in reinforcements.

The best move the Rams made might have been hiring Wade Phillips to coach the defense. That group was already capable of producing top-5 moments during Jeff Fisher’s mediocre reign there, so with Phillips, it could be even better, enough to keep the team competitive while they rebuild the offense.

Grade: C

Thursday was a weird one for the Chargers, but by the time the sun went down, they might have finally gotten something right.

It was a shock to see the Bills let Lynn get away. He was probably the only reason the team had any success at all this year and he did it by getting his players to respond to him with a bolder, more confident offense.

This is great news for Melvin Gordon’s future. Lynn was a running backs coach before he got promoted to coordinator.

Lynn was a rock in the midst of Rex Ryan’s blustery storm. The Chargers will need that kind of stability from their head coach as they go through the process of moving and trying to build a whole new fan base. No matter how you slice it, that also means that Lynn will have other distractions to deal with in 2017.

He’s looking to hire Gus Bradley as his defensive coordinator and keep Ken Whisenhunt as OC, according to reports.

This could give the Chargers a leg up on becoming the first NFL team in Los Angeles to post a winning season.

Grade: B