From Black Monday to renewed hope around the league, news travels fast when it comes to the NFL head coaching cycle. Teams have made new head coach hires over the last handful of weeks, moving quickly from some ugly endings to the 2024-25 season to what will hopefully be the beginning of something special.
Our latest NFL Power Rankings will take a break from your regularly scheduled programming to take a quick look at each of the new coaching situations around the NFL, ranking each new hire from worst to best.
Which new NFL head coaches are in the best situations? Which coaches were the most underwhelming of the hires? Who is set up to potentially pull off what we just saw with Dan Quinn and the Washington Commanders, going from the second-worst record in the NFL to the NFC Championship?
Note: At the time of this post being written, the New Orleans Saints had not yet hired a new head coach
NFL Power Rankings: Every new head coach hire ranked worst to best
6. Brian Schottenheimer, Dallas Cowboys
I will be the first one to say I do not understand this hire all that much. As worthy as Brian Schottenheimer may be based on his time in the league and overall pedigree, it's just hard to look at Dallas's situation and think anything except they missed out on their top targets.
I think Dallas would have preferred to go after Bill Belichick if they knew they were moving on from Mike McCarthy, but instead of just moving on -- which they eventually did -- they decided to drag their feet. And even if you feel like the Cowboys dodged a bullet by not hiring Belichick (which is kind of a wild take), they seemingly also missed out on Deion Sanders, who may have used their job opening for leverage.
It's hard to imagine Schottenheimer was truly their first option and feels more like a placeholder for whoever becomes available in 2026.
5. Liam Coen, Jacksonville Jaguars
I actually don't mind this hire at all. The Jacksonville Jaguars have tried a variety of coaches in recent years, and the glamorous hires of Urban Meyer and Doug Pederson that stole all the headlines failed miserably.
I kind of love the idea of going after Liam Coen, who has been part of the Sean McVay coaching tree and did great work this past year with Baker Mayfield and that Buccaneers offense. It feels like this has a chance to work out simply because there won't be a lot of (or as much) pressure on Coen early on unlike with Meyer and Pederson.