Is there a quantitative analysis of the best background for a head coa (1 Viewer)

[zftcg]

As we all obsess about who will fill the current HC vacancies, I was wondering what types of coaches have the best track record: former head coaches, hot-shot coordinators who get promoted, or successful college coaches? We all seem to have our own opinions about which background is better (I myself come down on the coordinator side, with a definite bias against former coaches, though college coaches seem to be in ascendance recently) but it's all pretty much anecdotal or based on gut feelings.

At this point, there should be enough data out there to draw meaningful conclusions. Feels like something one of the football quant sites might have done, but a Google search didn't turn up anything. Anyone know if it's out there, and if so, what it shows?

 

[IHEARTFF]

The ones who make good 4th down decisions

 

[fantasy stud]

My uneducated opinion is nowadays the perfect combination for a head coach is an offensive coach that has some toughness and leadership qualities. Examples of this would be Sean Payton, Jim harbaugh, possibly chip Kelly. What doesn't work are those offensive coordinator types that seem like they would rather be up in the booth calling plays and not really leaders of men. Examples of that are coaches like Jason Garrett, joe philbin, and mike malarkey. I am of a fan of defense, however it is more important to score points in today's nfl. Hiring a defensive coach who wants to win 17-14 just doesn't work anymore. Look at the numbers, all 12 playoff teams finished in the top 18 for points scored. 11 of the top 14 made the playoffs. 10 out of the top 21 teams for points allowed made the playoffs. Green Bay and Denver finished 24 and 26.

 

[Long Ball Larry]

Tough to say because the overwhelming majority of coaches are coordinators. To grab a rough idea of the numbers, I took all coaches who started coaching in 1980 or later and coached at least 48 games. I checked off whether they were college coaches, coordinators or head coaches. A few guys had multiple categories and a few I did not know off of the top of my head, though most likely they were just coordinators.

I get 74 coordinators, 13 former coaches, and 12 college coaches. Again, there is some overlap and I may look into it further to get more exact, but this was to give dirty, overall picture. FWIW, based on these groupings, former coaches had a 59% W/L % (for entire careers), college coaches had 53% W/L %, and coordinators were at 49.6%. Not that they mean much due to the flaws in this data sampling. I thought that this might be helpful to at least start to get a construct going, though.

Here are the former coaches and college coaches, in case anyone can think of anyone I missed (keeping in mind the 48 game cut-off).

Former Coaches

Bill Belichick

Bill Parcells

Dan Reeves

Dennis Green

George Seifert

Jim Mora

Mike Shanahan

Norv Turner

Pete Carroll

Romeo Crennel

Tom Coughlin

Tony Dungy

Wade Phillips

College Coaches

Barry Switzer

Bobby Ross

Butch Davis

Dennis Erickson

Dennis Green

Jim Harbaugh

Jimmy Johnson

John Mackovic

John Robinson

Pete Carroll

Steve Mariucci

Tom Coughlin

edit: oops, missed John Fox, Erickson, Jimmy Johnson, and Mariucci in the former coaches group. Actually a lot of overlap. Interesting.

 

[Riversco]

Last 10 head coaches to win a super bowl:

Offensive coaches: (6) Tom Coughlin, Mike McCarthy, Sean Payton, John Gruden, Brian Billick, **** Vermiel

Defensive coaches: (3) Mike Tomlin, Tony Dungy, Bill Belichick

Special Teams coaches: (1) John Harbaugh

Retreads: (5) Coughlin, Gruden, Vermiel, Dungy, Belichick

Directly from college ranks: 0

Not sure why you're gut is against former coaches and favors college coaches. Retreads are at 50% here. College coaches are at 0%.

 

[Riversco]

Jim Harbaugh, Pete Carroll, and Chip Kelly are all trying to become the 1st head coach to make the jump directly from college to super bowl champ since Jimmy Johnson.

 

[Adam Harstad]

Chase just recently broke down where NFL head coaches come from over at Football Perspective. Might be a start on what you're looking for.

 

[ShaHBucks]

They are usually a former coaches son. It's all about genetics.

 

[Biabreakable]

This is somewhat geared towards the Vikings, but some interesting information about criteria that may be important in coaches-

http://www.dailynorseman.com/2013/12/31/5257848/vikings-head-coach-headache-your-primer-on-possible-candidates/in/5027623

 

[ebsteelers]

Last 10 head coaches to win a super bowl:

Offensive coaches: (6) Tom Coughlin, Mike McCarthy, Sean Payton, John Gruden, Brian Billick, **** Vermiel

Defensive coaches: (3) Mike Tomlin, Tony Dungy, Bill Belichick

Special Teams coaches: (1) John Harbaugh

Retreads: (5) Coughlin, Gruden, Vermiel, Dungy, Belichick

Directly from college ranks: 0

Not sure why you're gut is against former coaches and favors college coaches. Retreads are at 50% here. College coaches are at 0%.

i think you might of forgot bill cowher. who was defense also

 

[zftcg]

Not sure why you're gut is against former coaches and favors college coaches. Retreads are at 50% here. College coaches are at 0%.

Like I said, it was more anecdotal, but my thought process was this: Recent SB-winning coaches mostly seem to have been former coordinators (Harbaugh, McCarthy, Payton, Tomlin, with Coughlin being the notable exception).

As for college coaches, doesn't it seem like it's only a matter of time? A few years ago, the poster boys for college-to-NFL were Spurrier, Saban and Petrino, all of whom flamed out spectacularly. Now it's Harbaugh, Carroll and Kelly, who have all achieved near-instant (and in the case of the first two, sustained) success. Which makes sense considering how much college offenses have been driving innovation at the pro level.

 

[massraider]

Not sure why you're gut is against former coaches and favors college coaches. Retreads are at 50% here. College coaches are at 0%.

Like I said, it was more anecdotal, but my thought process was this: Recent SB-winning coaches mostly seem to have been former coordinators (Harbaugh, McCarthy, Payton, Tomlin, with Coughlin being the notable exception).

As for college coaches, doesn't it seem like it's only a matter of time? A few years ago, the poster boys for college-to-NFL were Spurrier, Saban and Petrino, all of whom flamed out spectacularly. Now it's Harbaugh, Carroll and Kelly, who have all achieved near-instant (and in the case of the first two, sustained) success. Which makes sense considering how much college offenses have been driving innovation at the pro level.

It seems like that right now, sure. But this is a real small sample size of college coaches (Which Carroll is NOT, by the way).

 

[zftcg]

It seems like that right now, sure. But this is a real small sample size of college coaches (Which Carroll is NOT, by the way).

You mean because USC was essentially a professional team?

Seriously, I get what you're saying, and there would need to be some judgment calls on methodology. IMO, the criteria should be "Which experience was most relevant in getting the coach hired?" For Carroll, it was clearly his success at USC rather than his middling record with the Jets and Pats in the '90s. If Ken Whisenhunt gets hired, it probably has more to do with his HC experience at Arizona from '07-'12 than his work at SD this past year (although that certainly doesn't hurt him). O'Brien is also a close call -- I'd probably weight his OC experience with the Pats equally with his HC experience at Penn St. I suppose if you want to keep it simple, you could just go by what job they hold most recently before getting hired.

 

[massraider]

The coach either has NFL experience or not. Carroll is a retread.

 

[Dinsy Ejotuz]

I suspect that the route a guy takes is close to irrelevant, and that it's a grouping of personality traits and a strong front office that determine a coach's ultimate (long-term) level of success.