The hidden cost of firing your coach

Changing coaches makes developing NFL talent more difficult

By Albert Breer
NFL Media reporter
Published: Dec. 26, 2014 at 03:09 p.m. Updated: Dec. 26, 2014 at 06:41 p.m.

NFL Media’s Albert Breer touches on multiple topics in his robust Inside the NFL Notebook, including

» Why the coaching carousel might not spin as furiously as usual.
» The blueprint for stopping Jimmy Graham.
» How the Carolina Panthers positioned themselves for an improbable run.
And much more, beginning with a look at the difficulty of developing prospects in an NFL with high levels of coaching turnover. …

For the complete article and videos click here: http://www.nfl.com/news/story/0ap3000000449402/article/changing-coaches-makes-developing-nfl-talent-more-difficult

The 2011 draft class has quickly built a reputation as one of the best to come along in decades. And if you really look at it, it’s amazing those guys have developed the way they have.

As many of them complete their rookie deals and prep for a life-changing payday, another Black Monday is poised punctuate the challenge they’ve each faced getting here. Since that class entered the league, 18 of the NFL’s 32 teams have changed coaches. Four teams — the Cleveland Browns, Jacksonville Jaguars, Kansas City Chiefs and Tampa Bay Buccaneers — are on their third coach in that timeframe, and that’s not accounting for the clubs that went through large chunks of one of those seasons with an interim guy in place.

The problem here, as football people see it, is real. Players aren’t developing like they used to for a variety of reasons — and one of the first is related to environment.

“I think it has a tremendous effect on them,” said one veteran offensive coordinator. “Players are drafted by coaches and the personnel staff for a reason — they met a schematic element those guys had in mind. Most NFL coaches are good at developing people and players, but say that shift comes, then the new coach doesn’t like something about the fit with a guy. There’s no benefit of the doubt anymore, because he didn’t draft him. So he’s not getting better anymore.”

Take the 2011 rookies for the aforementioned quartet of three-coach teams — a pool of players that includes boom picks like Justin Houston, Cecil Shorts, Allen Bailey, Mason Foster and Jordan Cameron, and busts like Jon Baldwin, Greg Little and Blaine Gabbert.

Those guys entered the league in a lockout and under conditions where coaches were adjusting to rigid new rules that limited the time spent with — and workload that could be imposed on — players. And then there’s the fact that each of those teams has gone through two coaching changes since, meaning the draftees in question have had, at best, just one (truncated) offseason with any measure of normalcy — which is especially true for those who are no longer with their original squads.

This is probably a good time to mention that the great majority of players don’t make it to a fourth credited year in the NFL, or to a second contract of any significance.

Everyone knows being drafted by Seattle, New England or Denver can be an advantage. All these conditions make it an even bigger edge than one might think at first glance.

An NFC general manager put it like this: “You have storms colliding,” between the flood of underclassmen leaving college early and the growing gap between the college game, where schools are adjusting to simplify things for athletes, and the pro level, which continues to get more complicated.

The GM continued: “These kids are at their best when they’re playing fast, when they’re reacting. You can apply that to anyone in their job — if you have to think too much, it slows you down. Then you take the lack of an offseason, there’s too much time off, that’s affecting the kid’s ability to do his job. Now, if you keep changing scheme, add that to less time in the offseason, and they’re constantly thinking instead of reacting.”

The best test case over the past decade is probably Chiefs quarterback Alex Smith, taken first overall by the San Francisco 49ers in 2005. He was the first quarterback selected with a high draft pick to come out of a 2000s-era spread offense (at Utah), and he played for five different offensive coordinators, under two head coaches, in his first five years as a pro. In 54 games over that time, he completed 57.1 percent of his passes for 9,399 yards, 51 touchdowns, 53 picks and a 72.1 passer rating.

In 2011, coach Jim Harbaugh arrived in San Francisco, and he, offensive coordinator Greg Roman and quarterback coach Geep Chryst made a point to slow things down for Smith. Roman told me at the time, “You could tell he was taught a lot of different things. … A lot of things were just a little bit off, because he’s been told five different ways to do it. We thought if we could narrow his thought process, the benefits would show.”

In 56 games since, Smith has completed 63.4 percent of his passes for 11,459 yards, 71 touchdowns, 23 interceptions and a 92.8 rating.

The flip side of this could be seen in Patriots running back Jonas Gray’s 201-yard breakout against Indy in November. As the NFC GM sees it, “the unknown running back had a great game. It’s because they know their scheme, they know what works best against that type of defense. And they can say, ‘With what kind of back we have here, this is how we’ll do it.’ ”

That’s not to say Smith — who will miss the regular-season finale with a lacerated spleen — has suddenly turned into the NFL’s best quarterback. But it’s a pretty good example of what stability can do.

“It’s hard, especially at quarterback, to go through change,” said one AFC head coach. “You get three different coordinators in four years? That’s hard. The more you’re in a system, the more you’re with the same guys, the better. That goes for everyone — the offensive line, you have the same five guys working together, you’re better for it. But change three years in a row? How are you playing fast when you’re learning new things? How are you gonna adjust when new things come up?”

After a six-year stretch in which 45 coaching changes occurred, there are at least subtle signs of sanity.

In Miami, Ryan Tannehill, the eighth overall pick in 2012 — who has an option coming up that could land him more than $16 million in 2016 — was facing the possibility of learning his third offensive system in four years. Amid an internal assumption that the staff had to get to 9-7 to survive, Dolphins owner Stephen Ross called off the dogs when the team got to 8-7 last weekend, assuring the public that coach Joe Philbin would be back for a fourth season.

Meanwhile, in Washington, coach Jay Gruden and quarterback Robert Griffin III have (at least for now) dispelled the notion that a divorce is inevitable, which spared Griffin the same circumstance Tannehill was staring at, whether in D.C. or somewhere else.

“You draft to fit a skill set for a position, and you’d like to think, from a football intelligence standpoint, guys, especially at quarterback, can adapt,” said an AFC personnel director. “But the maturation and development of each guy, that process is impacted by his level of understanding as much as his intelligence. If there’s a new system, it takes time for that system to take hold. It’s repetition in a redundant process. You don’t want to be spending more time learning than polishing and refining.”

And too often, that’s exactly what’s happening.