So Ken Whisenhunt of the Titans finally got fired after one and a half seasons. Normally I’m one to say that I think coaches deserve three years. One year to turn around the locker room and try to clean up the mess of the previous coach, one year to start putting your pieces together and start building your team, and then one more year to show improvement in some meaningful capacity. If the team isn’t reasonably better at the end of year 3 (like a 5 win turnaround or so, maybe not playoff contention but relevant and not a trash heap) then the coach should be considered for firing. At least most of the time. Gus Bradley of the Jags is currently on the end of my stick, I think he deserves to get let go by season’s end. The Jags have turned around the locker room mentality, they are young and solid, but they still can’t seem to actually win anything. I think that falls on the coaching. If the Jags can rally up a better second half of the season and get out of the top 5 draft picks I think Gus could get one more year but that is it.

Whisenhunt seemed like a special case though. The Titans are trash. The Titans have been complete trash under his tenure. They look even worse now then they did before. I had hope after Mariota’s first game that Whiz had learned some things and it might work out, but it clearly wasn’t working. I’ve always been leery of midseason firings, especially when the organization will likely move on at the end anyway. Dan Campbell got promoted because clearly he’s a different type of guy and the players seemed into him. Whiz got fired for…Mularkey (Another TE coach lol) and I don’t think anyone expects the Titans to do better under a guy who the Jags fired after a single season, or that Mularkey will stick around at year’s end. Whis deserved to go, but if the Titans want to tank (which they pretty much appear to be doing now) they might as well keep him as a lame duck. They were on track for the #1 pick anyway.

Speaking of lame ducks, how about those Lions? What a turnaround. Remember last year when they almost won a playoff game and looked actually decent? What a change. Everyone is getting fired. Caldwell has again gone from a guy who got a team to the playoffs to a guy who is going to be fired the very next season. Now he’s a meaningless figurehead and the Lions are toast. He’s pretty much the opposite of the Titans, in that the Lions fired everyone but the head coach just to see what happens. Most seem to think Caldwell is safe for the season at least, though I don’t know about that. It’ll be interesting to compare the the teams pictured over the rest of this season. We’ve got 3 interesting scenarios.

Dolphins- Talented team hampered by bad HC no one liked, now under inexperienced general everyone likes, lots of hope

Titans- Bad team in need of more talent and better coaching, now under a different bad coach with little to no other change and no expected hope

Lions – Complete overhaul on offense and in the front office, lame duck coach, no expected hope