We're a quarter of the way through the season and a handful of 0-4 teams have coaches on the hot seat. The Miami Dolphins and head coach Tony Sparano are the leaders in that category but you also have to look at Jim Caldwell of the Indianapolis Colts and Steve Spagnuolo of the St. Louis Rams, both 0-4 teams.
NFL Coach Hot Seat: Tony Sparano Still Atop The List
Who’s seat is the hottest in the NFL? It starts with Tony Sparano in Miami although a couple other 0-4 teams need to be concerned.
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Which coach’s seat is the hottest? We’ll start in South Florida for this week’s edition of the NFL coaching hot seat.
1. Tony Sparano, Miami Dolphins: According to reports, he's safe through the Dolphins Week 6 game against the New York Jets. There was a lot of speculation that the Dolphins would choose to make a coaching change this week because it's the bye week -- the intrigue continued when the Dolphins canceled Sparano's Monday press conference -- but, reportedly, that won't be happening. Still, it seems it's only a matter of time before Sparano takes the fall in Miami. The Dolphins are 0-4 and their starting quarterback could miss a significant amount of time. That's not a good recipe for a coach on the hot seat.
2. Steve Spagnuolo, St. Louis Rams: There don't seem to be a lot of people talking about Spagnuolo's job security. The Rams won one game in his first season, leading to the Sam Bradford selection, and then surprised in 2010 winning seven games, which meant there were expectations on the Rams this year. Instead, they started out 0-4 and are looking at another lost season. Is Spagnuolo the problem in St. Louis?
3. Jim Caldwell, Indianapolis Colts: When your star quarterback goes does, you have a built-in excuse for being bad, so Caldwell has that going for him. But he's been taking a lot of heat locally for some of his coaching decisions, particularly in Monday night's loss to the Bucs. This will be an interesting one to watch because I don't think anyone really knows how the Colts ownership feels about Caldwell's progress when you throw in the Peyton Manning injury.
4. Jack Del Rio, Jacksonville Jaguars: Another situation that bears watching. Del Rio's been in Jacksonville since 2003 and they've qualified for the playoffs just twice in that time frame, and none of those came in the last four years. Del Rio is working with a rookie quarterback so keeping that continuity is the argument to keep him on board but at some point the Jags have to look at the situation and wonder how many chances he'll get.
5. Todd Haley, Kansas City Chiefs: KC started the season 0-3, including a pair of 30-plus point blowouts, so the speculation started that he was on the hot seat. The Chiefs nearly upset the Chargers in San Diego in Week 3, and got their first win of the season over the Minnesota Vikings in Week 4, so the hot seat talk has slowed a little bit. The Chiefs have had key injuries but they also had expectations entering the season. We'll see which way Haley takes the Chiefs over the next month.
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