Charles Robinson: Sean Payton should be atop our radar

I wouldn't put much stock into this stat about no coach ever winning a SB with two different teams. It's one thing if no SB winning coach made it deep into the playoffs with a 2nd team, but there are a bunch of coaches that have been really successful with multiple teams and I'd have no problem if we had our own version today of any of them (least favorite is maybe John Fox but still.. way better than what we've experienced!):

Don Shula: went deep into playoffs multiple times for Colts, including SB appearance.. then rest is history with the Dolphins
Bill Parcells: led 4 different teams to the playoffs, 3 to conference championships, 2 to the SB, and won the SB with one team twice.
Dan Reeves: played in 2 SB's, assistant coach in 3 SB's, head coach in 4 SB's for 2 different teams, but never won a SB as HC (what's so funny is as HC, he took Denver to the SB 3 times and lost.. the 4th time was with Atlanta and they lost to Denver in the SB haha).
Dick Vermeil: took 3 different teams to the playoffs by the 3rd year, took 2 teams to the SB and won with 1.
Mike Holmgren: took 2 different teams to SB and won with 1.
John Fox: took 2 different teams to SB but never won 1.

 

I hear Sean Payton is a train wreck off the field. That also scares me away.

 

Me neither and to your second point: During the coaching search before Phibin was hired, when a lot of people wanted Fisher and Cowher, this is what I kept saying and got a bit of Roberta Flack. Not that Fisher won a SB, but that he has been around and probably hit his peak awhile ago.

 

I think Belichek could do more with this team than Philbin's staff, sure. The question is how much of a difference would it make in wins and losses. I'm guessing 1-2 games. I think Brady would have a larger impact, 3-4 games.

 

I dunno. If you haven't won a Super Bowl then I think you could still be desperate to win one. Worked out for the Giants, certainly.

 

Sean Payton rode Brees. The ride's over. Also, how many coaches have won a super bowl with one team then went on to win one with another team? Hmmmmm....exactly.

 

There's only been how many? Holmgren should have won in Seattle. That's one in how many? Higher chance there than 1 in how many non super bowl winning coaches.

Not advocating Payton just the super bowl winning coach stuff

 

Yeah, I listed all 6 HC's that took two different teams to SB's in post #41. Only three won a SB before becoming a coach for another team: Parcells, Vermeil, Holmgren. So really small sample size.

Either way, I don't think a HC that's reached a SB with their second team somehow takes that game more lightly or cares less about winning it. SB's are hard to win period. More telling is whether a coach can take multiple teams deep into the playoffs. If you think a future HC can do that, that should be good enough.

 

Yeah, but that's a bit of an anomaly and a tough thing to gamble on.

 

No one is saying they care less with the new team.

Time is a factor. Actually its THE factor. Expectations are high when a SB winning coach comes in, problem is, generally for a new coach to be brought in the team wasn't very good which is why there was a vacancy. Now the new coach is expected to replicate his success with different players in a different division and he generally has less time to do it then the first time.

 

I don't know if I buy that argument (relative to a HC without a good previous record) without some data supporting it. I'd intuitively think a SB winning coach would have a longer leash than one that hasn't yet accomplished anything, precisely because of past credentials.

 

Who has been a long time coach at another team after winning a SB with another as HC?

 

Mike Holmgren: Seattle's coach from 1999-2008 after winning the SB with GB.

 

That's one.

 

There are only 3 HC's that won a SB and then went on the be the HC of another team so we might as well look at all 3. The other two are Dick Vermeil and Bill Parcells. Dick Vermeil was HC of KC from 2001-2005 and Bill Parcells became the HC of the Pats from 1993-1996 (only counting the HC job Parcells got after his SB win with the Giants).

So, with Holmgren that's an average of (10+5+4)/3 = 6.3 years tenure. The average HC tenure in the NFL is 38 months, so just over 3 years. I know it's very little data, but I think credentials help you keep your job even when you don't immediately perform well.

Oh.. Holmgren apparently got an 8 year contract up front. Where do you see that with a new hire with no NFL credentials?

 

That's not true. There are plenty more, like Shanahan, JJ, Seifert, etc.

 

True.. shows you one shouldn't trust a media report lol (actually I read it wrong.. I was only looking at HC's that went to 2 SB's.).. OK my bad.

 

Ditka, Stram, and even Lombardi.

Which I believe is 9 total.

 

Hee's how long those 9 coaches got at their next jobs:

Lombardi - 1 year
Stram - 2 years
Ditka - 3 years
Parcells - 4,3 & 4 years
JJ - 4 years
Seifert - 3 years
Holmgren - 10 years
Shanahan - 4 years
Vermeil - 5 years

 

OK.. let's just do the calculations then. So Lombardi = 1 year, Ditka = 3, JJ = 4, Shanahan = 4, Seifert = 3, Stram = 2.

So, we have (1+3+4+4+3+2+10+5+4)/9 = 4 years, so it's slightly above the NFL average (4 vs. 3.2 years).

 

And none of them have done it.

I still don't think your numbers are right, though.

 

i think of all of the candidates out there, Hue Jackson would get me the most excited if he ended up in miami.

 

I'm guessing you're referring to the average tenure of an NFL coach. Man.. there's no clear answer here with 10 minutes googling. The Ledger said 38 months but that's apparently only from 2004 (didn't pick that detail up the first time):
http://www.theledger.com/article/20...-Decade-Lovie-Smith-Might-Be-Number-69-&tc=ar

ESPN says going into 1980, the average tenure was 4.61 while in 2003 it was 2.75, but that's only looking at then-current coaches:
http://a.espncdn.com/nfl/columns/pasquarelli_len/1532190.html

Then you have the NYT which says 4.34 for then-current coaches in 2008:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F02E1DC1039F933A15751C1A96E9C8B63

So.. who knows what the actual average is.. hard stat to find in 10 minutes.

 

What is the percentage of SB winning coaches that took another team deep into the playoffs?

It is a good percentage. Tell me the Seahawks didn't get jobbed out of that one with 4 HUGE calls.

Hawks were wildly successful under him.

 

It's a short list of people though, because many HC's just stayed with those teams until they retired.

 

No I'm referring to your number of years you added up.

 

Deep? Looks like just those 3: Holmgren, Parcells and Vermeil, who all went to the SB a second time. Shanahan did get into the playoffs though (that RG3 season).

Anyway, 33% of SB winning coaches getting to the SB again with a new team is pretty good (hope the numbers are correct of course.. this stuff isn't easy to google in a short time).

 

lol no there's no error there. I did that in my head, but it adds to 36. Divide that by 9 and you get 4.

 

Sigh. No I'm saying I don't think you have the right numbers that you added up.

 

They're the same numbers as in your own post #59 (taking only the first HC jobs after a SB win).

 

It looks like you're not counting all of Parcells.

 

Right.. I said from the beginning I was only looking at the first HC jobs after a SB win.

If you include all of Parcells, then you get 43/11 = 3.9, which is hardly a difference. But I deliberately left out the other years because my argument was about credentials, and if you don't do well in your next job after the SB win, that changes the credentials.

So 36/9 = 4 is the appropriate calculation for the argument I was making.

 

I didn't say there would be a difference. It just didn't look is all.

Regardless, i think it gives credence to what I was saying that time is the biggest factor.

 

No, you said they wouldn't have as much time as the first time around. But if the calculation of 4 vs. 3.2 is trustworthy enough (again, the question is what is the actual average tenure of an NFL head coach?) then on average they have more time the 2nd time around (after they win the SB).

 

sigh, whatever.

 

Pass on Payton. Hue is a possibility.

 

What was an anomaly? An established second-team head coach winning a Super Bowl? I don't think so. Don Shula was the same. Bill Belichick. Tony Dungy. Jon Gruden. Mike Shanahan.

 

No. I meant that about coaches who have had such long tenures is the NFL with one team than go to another and have success. That's what I always meant and even though Payton didn't have that long of a tenure, I would use the same argument you used for Payton for those coaches. That's it. My apologies if I wasn't more clear. I am not saying it never happened. Out of the coaches you listed, I think Dungy was the closet, but still not the same as a Fisher or a Cowher, who were the coaches I used in my original point.

 

As a stats guy, wouldn't it be the right thing to throw or outliers, like Holglmgren with 10 years, and the 1 year guy? 10 years for one guy is significantly skewing the numbers.

Without Holmgren, you have 26/8, or 3.2 years. Without the one year guy, you have 25/7, or 3.5 years. Both of those almost exactly matching to average head coaching job length.

 

No.. the only real justification for throwing away data is if you can independently demonstrate the conditions under which that data was obtained was different than for the other data. Then you can throw it out. But once you set a condition under which data is obtained, you don't throw any data out.

Now.. one could ask if there are any statistical methods of determining whether something is an outlier or not, and while people have "rules of thumb", there is no principled method. Reason is because you don't know the type of distribution the data all came from. If you do know the type of distribution it came from, then yes you can say how unlikely that data is and throw it out if you wish. But long story short.. keep all the data that was obtained under the same conditions.