CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- New Orleans Saints coach Sean Payton was on the proverbial hot seat in 2016. His team went 7-9 for the third straight season. The gleam of the man who brought a city still feeling the devastation of Hurricane Katrina a Super Bowl title during the 2009 season was fading fast.

Then-owner Tom Benson stood pat, just as he did in 2012, when Payton was under fire for the "Bountygate" scandal.

Although Benson didn't live to see the benefits of his patience, the Saints have returned to NFL prominence. They are 11-2 heading into Monday night's game against the Carolina Panthers at Bank of America Stadium. And New Orleans, along with the Los Angeles Rams, is a favorite to win the NFC.

Now it's Carolina coach Ron Rivera, with five straight losses since a 6-2 start, who is on the hot seat. The man who got the Panthers (6-7) to the Super Bowl in 2015 is in danger of his second losing season in three years.

Fans are restless. There are rumblings that owner David Tepper is, as well -- although a league source tells ESPN that Rivera's job appears safe. Tepper, through a team spokesperson, declined to comment for this story.

Because Tepper hasn't had years to develop the loyalty that former Panthers owner Jerry Richardson showed Rivera during a 1-3 start to the 2013 season -- the same loyalty Benson showed Payton -- there's still uncertainty.

Coaches Sean Payton, left, and Ron Rivera will see each other on opposite sidelines on Monday night at Bank of America Stadium when the 11-2 Saints take on the 6-7 Panthers. AP Photo/Bob Leverone

If Tepper were to make a change, he would have to pay off the final two years of a $15.5 million extension that Rivera signed in January before Richardson sold the team for $2.275 billion.

Former NFL coaches Tony Dungy and Rex Ryan have been in this situation before. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers fired Dungy following the 2001 season after three straight trips to the playoffs. The New York Jets dumped Ryan in 2014 despite reaching the AFC Championship Game in 2009 and 2010.

The Bucs were rewarded with a Super Bowl victory in 2002 under new head coach Jon Gruden. The Jets had a 10-6 record in their first season with new head coach Todd Bowles.

Dungy and Ryan agree that Rivera, who has 70 wins and is four victories shy of becoming Carolina's all-time winningest coach, deserves more time to turn things around. They also agree Tepper is the wild card, because new owners often want to hire their own coaches.

"There's a lot of ways to do it and a lot of systems that work," said Dungy, now an analyst for NBC's "Football Night in America." "But the good organizations pick their own people, they believe in them and work things out.

"You go through bumps in the road like the Saints did with a couple of 7-9 seasons that wasn't what everybody wanted, but the thing there is they had a track record. They knew they had a Super Bowl coach. They know they had a quarterback that fit that system. Maybe whatever didn't go right during those 7-9 years you knew you could get corrected."

Ryan said history shows "if you stick with a guy long enough, he's going to come back and win."

Ultimately, Rivera's fate will come down to his short history with Tepper.

"Look, Rivera has done a great job there," said Ryan, now an analyst for ESPN. "People were talking about getting rid of him [in 2013]. Then he went on a huge win streak and that died down.

"Ownership has the right to do whatever they want, right, wrong or indifferent. From a coach's standpoint, I'd like to see them be patient. Ron Rivera, he's a great person, and I'd like to see him stay around."

Then Ryan recalled what Jerry Jones immediately did when he purchased the Dallas Cowboys in 1989.

"Jerry Jones kicked out Tom Landry," Ryan said of the decision to fire the Pro Football Hall of Fame coach who capped off his career with 250 victories. "He was pretty successful."

Pittsburgh the model?

Dungy learned a lot as a player and an assistant coach for the Pittsburgh Steelers, but what made arguably the biggest impression was then-owner Dan Rooney's philosophy on hiring a coach.

"I remember him telling us about Coach [Chuck] Noll, how he hired him and they're 1-13 in his first year," Dungy recalled. "He said during that one-win season that's when he knew he had the right guy the way coach responded after losses, how they were building and his plan.

"Dan's philosophy was, do you believe you have the right person? And if you believe you had the right person, you stick with them. If you come to the conclusion you don't have the right person, you make a change."

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That's a philosophy the Steelers have stuck to over the past 50 years, and it has paid off.

Noll went from 1-13, 5-9 and 6-8 during his first three seasons to a string of four Super Bowls wins in six seasons.

Bill Cowher took over in 1992. When Pittsburgh missed the playoffs three straight years (1998 to 2000) after six consecutive postseason trips, Rooney stuck with Cowher. The owner was rewarded with four trips to the playoffs in the next five seasons and a Super Bowl title in 2005.

Mike Tomlin was hired in 2007.

The Steelers won another Super Bowl in Tomlin's second season and got back there again in 2010. After going 8-8 in 2012 and 2013, he was on the hot seat; but ownership didn't budge, and Tomlin won 10 or more regular-season games during the next four seasons and reached the AFC Championship Game in 2016.

There's again outside noise this season with Pittsburgh 8-5-1, but the support of Tomlin hasn't wavered.

Not that the Pittsburgh model is foolproof. There are examples of teams that stuck with their coach and never achieved ultimate success. Marvin Lewis is in his 16th season at Cincinnati. The Bengals are 0-7 in the playoffs under him, and they are on the verge of their third straight losing season.

Jeff Fisher was with Houston/Tennessee for 17 seasons. After his team lost to the St. Louis Rams in Super Bowl XXXIV in 1999, the Titans went 2-5 in the playoffs and had six seasons of 8-8 or worse in the next 11 years.

But those organizations at least have had more success than those constantly changing coaches. The Cleveland Browns have had six head coaches since 2010, and not one has had a winning record.

The Browns also fired Bill Belichick following the 1996 season after one winning record in five years. Four years later, Belichick landed in New England, where he has won five Super Bowls and been to eight.

That Tepper grew up in Pittsburgh and is a former minority owner of the Steelers could have an influence on whether he tests the Rooney theory and sticks with Rivera. But as Dungy reminded, Jimmy Haslam was a minority owner with the Steelers before he purchased the Browns in 2012.

Jerry Jones has regrets

There's no greater example of a new owner wanting his own coach in place than Jones, who on his first day as the owner of the Cowboys fired one of the most legendary coaches in NFL history.

Landry won two Super Bowls and five NFC Championships from 1960 to 1988, but after three straight losing seasons and no playoff wins since 1982, Jones decided it was time to clean house. He hired Jimmy Johnson.

After going 1-15 and 7-9 in his first two seasons, Johnson got the Cowboys back to the playoffs in 1991 and won Super Bowls the next two seasons.

In 2014, Jones said he regretted firing Landry so quickly.

"If I had a chance to do it over again, I would've waited a year and just got my feet on the ground a little bit more and probably just gone with the staff that we had and then later made the ultimate change that I made," Jones said.

If Panthers owner David Tepper, right, were to make a change at head coach, he would have to pay off the final two years of a $15.5 million extension that Rivera signed in January. Grant Halverson/Getty Images

Jones went through five coaches after he and Johnson split following the 1993 season. But Jones has been incredibly patient since with Jason Garrett, who has been his head coach since replacing Wade Phillips during the 2010 season.

Garrett's team didn't make the playoffs during his first four seasons, and he is 1-2 in the playoffs since 2014. There were more cries for Garrett's job after a 3-5 start this season, but an 8-6 record has the Cowboys sitting atop the NFC East with two games remaining.

Stephen Jones, Dallas' executive vice president, CEO and director of player personnel, weighed in: "I think people get into a mix a lot of times of rushing to change something just because you're having a little bad run and you're not exactly where you hope to be. I don't necessarily think that the answer is always change.

"You get into that and you see what is going on around the league, you get new coaches and they want to change out all the personnel. You can find yourself starting over if you don't watch out."

Once Rivera was the example

When Payton was under fire in 2016, it was Richardson and Rivera who were the example of how patience and loyalty pays off.

Richardson was rewarded with a 12-4 record and NFC South title after a rough start to the 2013 season, then with an NFL-best 15-1 record and a trip to Super Bowl 50 two seasons later.

Payton doesn't see a need for a change now despite Carolina's struggles. The Panthers are still mathematically alive for a wild-card spot.

"The success that they've had just [as] an organization, certainly while Ron has been there, has been unprecedented for Carolina," Payton said. "We have a ton of respect for what he's done and how they've played."

Rivera respects Payton. That the Saints stuck by Payton after the 2016 season spoke volumes to him on the importance of continuity.

"If you've had success before and you think you have the right formula, yeah, why not?" Rivera said. "You look at some organizations that have changed head coaches time and time again, they seem to struggle.

"Pittsburgh ... since Chuck Noll, they've only had three head coaches. So when you look at things, it's about continuity."

Rivera offered a reminder that the Panthers lost continuity this past offseason with the hiring of new offensive, defensive and special-teams coordinators.

Carolina's biggest struggles this season have been on defense, to the point that Rivera, a former defensive coordinator with the Chicago Bears and San Diego Chargers, took over the playcalling.

But what Rivera has in common with Payton and other coaches who have bounced back after a tough season is a franchise quarterback.

Payton has Drew Brees, a future Hall of Famer who on a Monday night earlier this season broke Brett Favre's record for most completions in NFL history.

Rivera has Newton, who despite a sore shoulder right now is on his way to becoming the best dual-threat quarterback in NFL history.

"Generally, the coaches that have the most success are the ones that have the quarterback," Ryan said. "Now in Carolina's case, obviously Cam is a great quarterback, one of the best in the league. I don't know if he's 100 percent."

Dungy agreed.

"Ron's a good coach," Dungy said. "Ron's going to get them back to the top if given time. That remains to be seen. I get disappointed in people that make the hire, say, 'Yes, this is my guy, we do well, everybody is on board.' Then you have a couple of bad years and people want a change, and all of a sudden it's the wrong person or I run out of patience.

"I've seen that happen a lot. I don't think that's the way to build long-term effectiveness."