If you’ve ever wondered how fast the NFL moves, here’s your annual reminder: you can finish a season with a “technically respectable” record, win your last game, shake hands at midfield… and still be cleaning out your office before the Monday morning news cycle warms up.

That’s where we’re at after the 2025 regular season. Four head coaches were fired immediately after Week 18 — Raheem Morris in Atlanta, Pete Carroll in Las Vegas, Kevin Stefanski in Cleveland, and Jonathan Gannon in Arizona — and the league’s coaching carousel suddenly has six total openings, when you add the jobs that already came open in Tennessee and New York earlier in the season.

And look, coaching changes are nothing new. But these firings weren’t all the same, either. Some were about the long-term plan never really existing. Some were about a plan that existed… then got hit by reality. And some were the football version of a relationship ending because both people are exhausted and can’t keep pretending date night fixes everything.

Still, when you zoom out, there’s one theme tying all six openings together: the NFL is a quarterback league, and if your quarterback situation is unstable, your head coach is going to find himself on the hot seat.

Atlanta Falcons: Cleaning House With Real Questions All Over the Roster

The Falcons didn’t even end the season in a tailspin. They finished strong. They won games late. There was a stretch where you could convince yourself this thing was starting to turn the corner.

That’s what makes this one tricky. Late-season momentum feels good — it gives fans something to hold onto — but it can also mask everything that went wrong before it. Atlanta didn’t just stumble early; they buried themselves. And once you do that in the NFL, you don’t get style points for climbing back to .500.

Atlanta fired Raheem Morris and GM Terry Fontenot on Sunday night after the season ended. Morris finished 8-9 in 2024 and 8-9 in 2025, going 16-18 across two full seasons. On paper, that’s not disastrous. In reality, it’s the most dangerous place a franchise can live.

If you’re an owner, 8-9 can feel worse than 6-11.

Six wins is honest. Six wins tells you something’s broken and needs fixing.

Eight wins? That’s the record that keeps you stuck in conversation mode. You’re not bad enough to blow it up cleanly, but you’re not good enough to scare anyone.

The Defense Actually Improved… Which Makes the Firing Even More Interesting

This is where Morris’ firing — to me — has been the most surprising, because if you’re just looking for proof the guy can still coach, it showed up on defense.

Morris is a defensive coach, and for the first time in a while, Atlanta actually looked like it had an identity on that side of the ball. After finishing near the bottom of the league in sacks the year before, the Falcons set a single-season franchise record with 57 sacks in 2025.

That’s not a throwaway stat. It was the exact kind of growth teams talk about when they hire a defensive head coach — tougher up front, more consistent pressure, fewer plays where the quarterback had all day to get comfortable.

So why fire him anyway?

Because in the NFL, improvement only matters if it shows up on the scoreboard. Defensive progress is great. Sack totals are great. But if the wins don’t follow,  that progress starts to feel insignificant.

Fair or not, head coaches don’t get evaluated in pieces. They get evaluated on whether the whole thing is moving forward. And in Atlanta’s case, ownership decided it still wasn’t.

The Cousins–Penix Offseason Doomed Them

Atlanta’s biggest issue wasn’t effort. It wasn’t buy‑in. And it really wasn’t talent. It was the quarterback plan.

The Falcons tried to live in two timelines at once, and that almost never works in the NFL. They handed Kirk Cousins a massive free‑agent contract, selling it as the move that would finally stabilize the position. A proven veteran. A steady hand. Someone who could get this roster into January and stop the annual quarterback roulette.

Then, just over a month later, they used the No. 8 pick on Michael Penix Jr.

That’s not a subtle pivot. That’s the front office hedging in real time.

It felt like the Falcons were trying to calm two different fears at once: the fear of wasting a roster that looked ready to compete, and the fear of committing long‑term to a quarterback they didn’t fully trust. So instead of choosing one path, they straddled both.

And it didn’t stop there. Penix showed flashes — enough to remind you why he was drafted that high — but the concerns followed him, too. He tore his ACL in Week 11 of this season, and it wasn’t even the first major knee injury of his career.

So Atlanta finished the year with:

• a veteran quarterback they paid like a franchise savior,

• a high first‑round rookie they drafted like a franchise savior,

• and neither of them playing well enough — or staying healthy enough — to bring fans any real hope for the future.

It’s easy to understand why those decisions ultimately cost Terry Fontenot his job.

The harder question — and the one Falcons fans keep circling — is whether those were really Raheem Morris’ decisions.

Arthur Blank Is Not Holding Back

Arthur Blank didn’t sugarcoat this one.

After the typical phrases like “alignment” and “new direction.” Blank said the results weren’t good enough — and then made it clear this wasn’t just about swapping out a coach. The Falcons are restructuring how football decisions get made.

"We will be adding a new president of football from outside the organization. The leader in this new role will set the vision and identity for our team. Our new head coach and general manager will report to the new president of football, and they will work collaboratively as a football leadership team on all football decisions. Final decision-making authority will rest with the president of football."

That’s not a cosmetic change. That’s an ownership-level admission that the old setup wasn’t working.

When an owner changes the power structure, he’s saying the issue wasn’t one bad season or one bad call — it was how decisions were being made in the first place. And in Atlanta’s case, that likely traces straight back to the quarterback plan that never fully made sense.

This is Blank stepping in and saying, “We’re not doing this again.”

The Job Offer Looks Nice — Until You Read the Fine Print

On the surface, Atlanta’s opening looks appealing.

There’s talent. You don’t have to squint to see it. There are playmakers on offense. The defense finally looks aggressive and disruptive. The division is winnable if you get competent quarterback play.

But then you get to the fine print.

The next regime is inheriting a decision tree that’s full of pressure points:

• Cousins’ contract is still very real, even with restructuring.

• Penix’s health is obviously a massive concern.

• And Atlanta doesn’t have a 2026 first‑round pick, after trading it in the deal that brought James Pearce Jr. over from the Rams.

In today’s NFL, not having a first‑round pick is like going to Costco without a cart. You can still shop. You can still convince yourself you’re fine. But eventually your arms are full, something’s slipping, and you’re one bad move away from dropping everything.

Las Vegas Raiders: Pete Carroll’s One-Year Experiment

The Raiders fired Pete Carroll after one season, which is crazy on the surface because Pete Carroll is Pete Carroll. A Super Bowl winner. A culture guy. One of the few coaches whose resume usually buys him the benefit of the doubt.

But the NFL doesn’t care about resumes when the current team can't win — and Las Vegas’ tape was brutal.

The Raiders went 3-14, tied for the worst record in the league, and landed the No. 1 overall pick in the 2026 draft. That’s not a season where you talk yourself into progress. That’s a season where the building knows, pretty early on, that this isn’t working.

The Quarterback Play Was a Weekly Adventure (And Not the Fun Kind)

The Raiders brought in Geno Smith, and on paper, it made sense. Veteran presence. Familiarity with Pete Carroll. Someone who could at least keep the offense on schedule while the rest of the roster tried to catch up.

Instead, the season turned into a weekly reminder of how thin the margin is when quarterback play slips even a little.

• Geno finished with 17 interceptions, the most in the league.

• He was also sacked 55 times, tied for the league lead.

Those two numbers together tell a pretty clear story.

You could see it week to week. Early pressure sped things up. Missed throws led to longer third downs. Longer third downs led to more hits. And once that cycle starts, it’s hard to slow it down without a run game or a dominant offensive line to lean on.

The Worst Offensive Line in the League Is Impossible to Work With

Las Vegas averaged 77.5 rushing yards per game, dead last in the NFL — and that number honestly undersells how rough it looked on film.

Nothing came easy. Runs were getting hit at the line. Lanes closed almost immediately. And by the second quarter most weeks, the ground game already felt like something the Raiders were forcing themselves to try, not something they actually believed in.

First-round pick Ashton Jeanty had a rough rookie season, but it’s hard to put a ton of the blame on him. He finished with 1,321 rushing yards, which doesn’t jump off the page. What does jump off the page is that 1,021 of those yards came after contact.

That’s not a fun stat for an offensive line.

That tells you Jeanty was creating on his own — lowering his shoulder, dragging defenders, fighting for extra yards just to get back to the line of scrimmage. That’s completely unsustainable.

When your run game depends on your rookie back breaking tackles just to get positive yardage, you’re not really running an offense. You’re surviving one snap at a time. And that kind of environment wears everyone down, especially the quarterback.

The Staff Shakeups Were a Giant Flare in the Sky

If you ever want to know when a season is going sideways inside a building, watch what happens to coordinators.

Pete Carroll fired the offensive coordinator and the special teams coordinator within a 16-day span in November. That’s not fine-tuning.

Those moves usually don’t fix anything — they just confirm what everyone already feels. The locker room knows when things are off. Players know when the plan isn’t working. And once assistants start getting shuffled midseason, it’s a pretty clear signal that trust is fraying.

Combine that with a ten-game losing streak, and you can see why the organization decided the vibe wasn’t worth saving.

The Patience Has to Be Real

This will be the Raiders’ sixth head coach since 2021.

Read that again.

That’s the kind of turnover that makes top coaching candidates look at your opening and decline to even interview. Because at some point, coaches stop asking just one question.

It’s not only, “Can I win here?”

It’s, “Will they let me build?”

The Raiders kept GM John Spytek, and he’s leading the coaching search in close collaboration with minority owner Tom Brady. That’s the pitch. Stability up top. Alignment. A shared vision.

But it also comes with a very real reality check. Vegas has to prove this isn’t another short-term experiment.

They have one of the most valuable assets in the sport — the No. 1 overall pick. That gives the next coach a chance to tie his future to a quarterback from Day 1. But none of that matters if in two years they're finding that quarterback a new coach.

If the Raiders want this hire to work, patience can’t just be something they talk about during the press conference. It has to show up when the growing pains do.

Cleveland Browns: Even a Two-Time Coach of the Year Can’t Outrun the Browns QB Room

A team firing Kevin Stefanski should have been the weirdest of them all — but then you realize it's the Cleveland Browns, and it becomes a lot less shocking.

This is a two-time NFL Coach of the Year (2020 and 2023). He led Cleveland to two playoff appearances, which, in that city, actually matters. This is a franchise that spent two decades cycling through coaches, quarterbacks, and half-baked rebuilds. Stefanski brought structure. He brought professionalism. For stretches, he even made the Browns feel… normal.

But the NFL doesn’t grade on resume. It never has.

The Browns went 8-26 over the last two years, including a 5-12 finish in 2025. By the end of this season, the offense wasn’t just struggling — it was stuck, finishing near the bottom of the league in just about every category.

The Browns Have Lived in QB Chaos for Six Straight Years

Here’s the number that explains Stefanski’s tenure better than any debate, hot take, or press conference:

Cleveland used an NFL-high 13 different starting quarterbacks during his six seasons.

Thirteen.

That’s not a plan. That’s survival.

Some of it was injuries. Some of it was performance. Some of it was just panic. But when your quarterback room is constantly changing, nothing else ever gets a chance to breathe. The offense resets every few weeks.

Stefanski spent six seasons trying to build continuity in a place that never stopped moving the most important piece. At some point, fair or not, the organization decided it needed a new voice — even if the real problem has been standing under center the whole time.

Deshaun Watson Wasn’t Just a Gamble — It Reshaped the Franchise

Let’s not dance around it: the Deshaun Watson decision is the original sin of this era of Browns football.

Cleveland didn’t just take a swing here. They emptied the chamber. A massive trade package, then a $230 million fully guaranteed contract, all wrapped in the belief that once the quarterback problem was solved, everything else would fall into place.

Instead, it’s been the opposite. Since arriving, Watson has appeared in just 19 games, sidelined by suspension and injuries. When he’s played, the results have been everything from from streaky to outright frustrating.

And while Watson’s play (or absence) became a weekly talking point, the real damage was quieter and more lasting.

The fully guaranteed deal — the first of its kind in the NFL — immediately came back to haunt them. Every time they looked to get out from under his contract, they realized they couldn't do it. It simply cost too much.

Stefanski didn’t sign that contract. He didn’t negotiate it. But he was forced to coach under its shadow every single week.

Shedeur Sanders, the Future?

By the end of 2025, Cleveland was starting Shedeur Sanders, a fifth-round rookie, for the final seven games of the season — which, honestly, tells you a lot about where the Browns still are at quarterback.

Sanders went 3-4 in that stretch. The passing numbers weren’t great. There were rookie reads, missed throws, and moments where the game clearly sped up on him. But there was also enough competitiveness — enough fight — to make things uncomfortable in a familiar Cleveland way.

In maybe the most Browns outcome possible, Sanders played them out of a top-three draft pick. That might not sound like much, but with a thin quarterback class coming out in the draft, it may have bought him another season to prove whether he’s a placeholder or something more.

And in a fitting twist, Stefanski has already been floated by many around the league as one of the top coaching candidates in this cycle. Which tells you something important — teams still believe in the coach, even if Cleveland doesn't.

The frustrating part is the roster itself isn’t hopeless. The Browns actually had a strong 2025 draft class, and there are young building blocks on both sides of the ball.

But until the quarterback spot is truly stabilized, Cleveland will keep living in the same reality: the coach gets blamed for the one problem the franchise can’t seem to fix.

Arizona Cardinals: He Built a Culture, But It Wasn't a Winner

Arizona firing Jonathan Gannon wasn’t shocking.

The Cardinals lost 37-20 to the Rams in Week 18, which was their ninth straight loss to finish 3-14. Under Gannon, Arizona went 15-36 across three seasons and never finished higher than third in their own division.

This year’s divisional record was simply inexcusable: 0-6 in the NFC West, with a lot of the losses feeling non-competitive by the end.

Owner Michael Bidwill didn’t try to dress it up. He said the decision came down to wins and losses, and pointed out the team had won one game since Week 2.

The Week 5 Sideline Incident Became a Symbol

Every coach has moments where emotions boil over. It happens.

But Gannon’s Week 5 incident against the Titans went beyond “heated.” After a play where running back Emari Demercado prematurely dropped the ball near the goal line, cameras caught Gannon screaming at him and appearing to hit him. The Cardinals fined Gannon $100,000 for the altercation.

If you’re a fan, that moment sticks because it felt like a snapshot of the whole season: tension, mistakes, and the sense that everything was heavier than it needed to be.

Arizona also dealt with discipline issues on the field, including a franchise-record 17 penalties in one game — that kind of stuff always falls back on the head coach.

The Kyler Murray Question Is Unavoidable

The Cardinals kept GM Monti Ossenfort, and now the biggest decision is the one Arizona has been circling for years:

What is Kyler Murray’s future here?

He went down with a foot injury early in the year and missed a huge chunk of the season — and at first it felt like the normal NFL “we’ll see you in a week or two” routine. Then it kept dragging. He was inactive for weeks while Jacoby Brissett started, and that’s where the whispers started: Is he still hurt? Are they being cautious? Or did this quietly turn into a benching?

Arizona’s official stance was that it was medical. The team placed Murray on injured reserve in early November, and Jonathan Gannon later said Murray even went out of state for another opinion — the injury just wasn’t progressing to the point where it made sense for him to return.

But here’s the thing: in the NFL, when a franchise quarterback disappears for months and the team never really gives a clean “he’s definitely our guy next year” message, fans are going to fill in the blanks.

Even Monti Ossenfort came out and said it pretty openly:

“All options are on the table."

Between Murray’s injury, the contract reality, and Arizona holding the No. 3 overall pick, it’s not hard to see why the league-wide assumption is that a separation is coming. Whether it’s a trade or just cutting ties completely, it feels like the Cardinals are finally at the point where they have to make a real decision.

Six Openings, One Question

So now we’re sitting at six head-coaching openings, and every one of them comes with its own set of complications.

Some jobs look appealing because of draft position. Some because there’s real roster talent already in place. Some just because the division feels winnable if you just get competent quarterback play. But none of them are clean. Every opening comes with at least one big question the next coach has to answer immediately.

And this isn’t exactly a loaded coaching market right now. Barring something unexpected from a playoff team, the pool of obvious, slam-dunk candidates is pretty thin. That means teams aren’t just hunting for the perfect fit — they’re trying to convince themselves they’ve found the right one in a cycle without many no-brainers.

Fans love coaching changes in January because hope is undefeated. New coach means new playbook, new staff, new slogans, and a clean slate.

But the reality is more grounded than that. Coaches don’t get hired to bring vibes. They get hired to fix problems.

All stats courtesy of NFL Pro.