Crennel, Head Coaching, and Coordinating

[San Jose Bills Fan]

I was musing about Kansas City Head Coach Romeo Crennel and his decision to fire himself as Defensive Coordinator so that he can spend more time overseeing KC's anemic offense.

 

About 3 weeks ago or so, I suggested here that because the Bills offense had been average at best with poor play calling and bad game management, and because the defense had been historically bad (NFL history, not Bills history) that Gailey would have little or nothing to lose by stepping down as offensive coordinator, handing the reigns to Curtis Modkins, and acting as more of a head coach with oversight in all areas.

 

So I got to thinking, there was a time in the NFL where it was fairly common for the head coach to coordinate one side of the ball.

 

But then I got to thinking, which head coaches still coordinate either the offense or the defense for their teams and are doing so successfully?

 

According to articles, Bill Belichick actually has stepped away from coordinating the Cheatriots*** defense and has been concentrating on the offensive side for the last three seasons. His brainchild was the highly-successful two tight end set which is New England's base offense.

 

Mike Shanahan, Norv Turner, Jason Garrett, Pat Shurmur, Mike Mularkey and Chan Gailey all try to coordinate their teams' offenses and none of them are having winning seasons. Andy Reid also runs his offense but his team presently has a losing record. Sean Payton runs his team's offense but he's not coaching at the moment and his team has a losing record.

 

The only head coaches I can think of with winning records who coordinate their offenses are Houston's Gary Kubiak and Green Bay's Mike McCarthy. As I said earlier you could arguably put Belichick in this category although I don't know if he calls his teams offensive plays.

 

On the defensive side, it's a similar situation. Besides Crennel, other head coaches who are active defensive coordinators are Leslie Frazier, Ron Rivera, Marvin Lewis, and Dennis Allen. Every one of these head coaches preside over a losing team.

 

So by my count, of the 32 head coaches in the NFL, 16 of them insist on coordinating either their offense or defense.

 

Of those 16, only 3 of them have winning records.

 

If you count Payton and Reid, only 5 head coach/coordinators have had winning programs in today's NFL.

 

My conclusion is that the ability to be a head coach and also coordinate a unit is a skill that only a small handful of coaches can successfully handle.

 

It seems to me that the Head Coach/Coordinator may go the way of the Head Coach/GM which is to say, the way of stick 'em and straight ahead placekickers.

 

My gut feeling is that in today's NFL, trying to wear more than one hat is a feat that only a very small group of men can do competently.