The last time we ran NFL numbers for touchdowns scored and allowed as a percentage of drives, we noted that coaching changes would be an important area of study. Those often trigger big changes in performance, whether for better or worse. Today, we start that effort by isolating the main teams to study.
First, you should be aware that SEVEN teams have new head coaches this season. I was thinking about narrowing that down further just to teams who “cleaned house” with their offensive and defensive coordinators too. But, that was basically all of the seven anyway. Carolina changed its head coach and offensive coordinator (keeping the defensive coordinator). Atlanta, the LA Chargers, New England, Seattle, Tennessee, and Washington all cleaned house.
So, let’s make it a point of emphasis to study THOSE SEVEN teams out of the gate to see which teams may be getting bettor or worse in TD ratios.
Last time, we presented three groups of teams as “top championship threats,” “incredibly dense parity pack,” and “rags to riches?” Unsurprisingly, none of the top championship threats changed head coaches. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it! Nobody in the best group retired. There weren’t any near miss teams that decided they needed to change to get over the hump (Dallas seems to always be near that list). The seven coaching changes came from the other two hunks…
INCREDIBLY DENSE PARITY PACK
Tennessee even (17% on offense, 17% on defense)
Atlanta -2 (16% on offense, 18% on defense)
New Tennessee coach Brian Callahan was the offensive coordinator for Cincinnati from 2019-2023. We should be monitoring early results to see if the offense can improve from 17% while the defense hopes to stand pat after the house-cleaning. That’s already a playoff caliber defense. But, the offense may be led by relatively inexperienced Will Levis, meaning there could be growing pains early in this transition.
New Atlanta coach Raheem Morris has some experience as a head coach already, and is otherwise a defensive assistant. This is ALREADY a good defense and might get better. We can assume that new quarterback Kirk Cousins will be a virtual coach on the field for the Falcons offense. If Cousins can nudge that percentage up to 20% or better, the Falcons have a chance to matter.