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Raiders have had by far NFL's worst head coach hires of past 5 years
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- Raiders have had by far NFL's worst head coach hires of past 5 years
The past couple weeks have been a whirlwind of head coach changes across the NFL. Some head coaches were fired during the season and replaced with interim coaches. Others opened up immediatley after the season ended. And one, in the case of the Bills , opened up two weeks after the regular season ended because Buffalo appeared in a couple playoff games first.
That process appears to be coming to a close as eight teams have hired new head coaches the the final two -- the Raiders and Cardinals -- are expected to make their decisions by this weekend.
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With all the new coaches comes new hopes. Some candidates were highly thought of. But even the most highly respected coaches flop. Just because a team gets the guy they wanted, doesn't mean he's the right choice.
No team has made more mistakes in their head coaching hires the past five years than the Raiders . It's the reason they have hired and fired three head coaches in that time. And are about to add a fourth.
ESPN's Bill Barnwell set about ranking head coach hires since 2021 . And the Raiders were easily the worst team there. Out of 37 head coaches ranked, Las Vegas 's three coaches -- Josh McDaniels, Antonio PIerce, and Pete Carroll -- were ranked 30 (Pierce), 31 (Carroll), and 32 (McDaniels).
Three straight Raiders coaches! McDaniels finished with a better winning percentage than Carroll or Pierce, but we should keep in mind that he took over a Raiders team that was coming off a playoff berth in the AFC. McDaniels and general manager Dave Ziegler decided to make a series of aggressive moves, trading two picks for Davante Adams , signing Chandler Jones as a free agent and eventually moving on from longtime Raiders quarterback Derek Carr , replacing him with Jimmy Garoppolo .
The moves ranged from ill-advised to disastrous. McDaniels endured a series of embarrassing losses, most notably when Baker Mayfield joined the Rams in the middle of December and beat the Raiders with a bunch of backup linemen and receivers, having barely learned the playbook. McDaniels was fired midway through his second season, which was also how his brief tenure in Denver came to an end. I'm not sure there's another coach who was fired before completing two seasons in two different head coaching roles.
That is one pathetic run of bad hires. Set off by the monumental McDaniels mistake. Then compounded when they stuck with a volatile out-of-his-depth Antonio Pierce, and finally coaxing way-past-it fallback option Pete Carroll out of retirement last year.
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No other team in the NFL had three coaches listed outside the top 15, let alone outside the top 30. Only three teams had three coaches on the list at all -- the Raiders, Texans , and Jaguars . The Texans had two coaches ranked lower than the Raiders -- Lovie Smith (33) and David Culley (34) -- but the franchise's three-year run with Demeco Ryans at the helm puts those previous mistakes well in the rear view.
This offseason, the Raiders appear to be taking their time try and get it right, by waiting in the hopes of landing Klint Kubiak who will be coaching the Seahawks ' offense in the Super Bowl. If they can lure him in, he would already look like their wisest hire in a very long time. Which notably isn't a high bar to clear.
This article originally appeared on Raiders Wire: Raiders have had by far NFL's worst head coach hires of past 5 years
