This is a family affair.
My son, Kevin, who works with me at Qoxhi Picks, has been voicing his wonderment why a number of head coaches haven’t already been fired this year. His old man, who attempts to steer him in a lane supported by history, explains that most firings will happen on the Monday after the conclusion of the regular season.
“But these guys have to go,” Kevin states as if he was running the teams in question and ready to turn the page.
Well, the league matched their normal number of coaches let go during the season on Friday when the Chicago Bears cried wolf and sent former head coach Matt Eberflus his walking papers. The Bears story is one that started bright and dimmed first to a flicker before dousing Eberflus’ flame today. Chicago, behind rookie quarterback Caleb Williams and a talented defense, opened the season with four wins in six starts.
Then, burned by a Hail Mary pass in Washington by Commanders rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels, the Bears quest for a fifth win slipped away. Then, like Lucy egging Charlie Brown on to try another kick with her holding the ball, Chicago’s fifth win just never came. In response, they first fired their offensive coordinator three weeks ago, and now their head coach.
A blocked field goal cost Chicago a win over the talented Green Bay Packers. An overtime loss to the Vikings followed and on Thanksgiving Eberflus had as much trouble with clock management as my daughter did reading a clock with hands in high school. I know this could be embarrassing, but she had grown up with clocks always displaying the time with a digital readout. How she missed knowing when the big hand is on this and the little hand is on that what time it is was simply beyond me.
Perhaps a result of bad parenting, although she went on to be a very successful lawyer and her intelligence has never been in question. Of course, raising a kid to be a lawyer could be viewed as another indicator of bad parenting.
But I digress.
Trailing by three points in Detroit on Thanksgiving, Eberflus’s Bears were within a couple yards of the declared field goal range for their kicker with more than 30 seconds left on the game clock and a timeout left on their side. Somehow, the Bears coach turned that situation into a single desperation pass that fell incomplete while time ran out on the clock.
Perhaps even worse than the clock management was his refusal to admit an error after the game, instead defending his use of the final 30 seconds of game clock on Thanksgiving with a ramblin story that was akin to a fifth-grader explaining why he didn’t have his homework done.
As soon as the Bears fired their coach, who was on Kevin’s hit list, he blurted out the next head coach he thinks should be fired immediately. Jacksonville’s Doug Pederson.
The Jaguars head coach is an interesting story. A few years ago, he beat Tom Brady and company in Super Bowl LII with Nick Foles at quarterback for an inspired Philadelphia Eagles team. His success was hailed while he became the only head coach in Philadelphia history to lead the Eagles to a Super Bowl win.
His success in Philadelphia faded like a cheap umbrella left in the sun. When he lost that job, the Jaguars brought him on after two years of last place finishes in the AFC South Division. In his first year with Jacksonville, the former Eagles coach guided Trevor Lawrence and company into the playoffs and an opening postseason win over the Los Angeles Chargers.
Off that meteoric rise in results, my numbers showed the Jaguars should have had a down year in 2023, which they did by missing the playoffs, and just as predictable, a rise back to playoff contention this year.
Which they haven’t.
I don’t know what is wrong with the Jaguars but everything from questioning their franchise quarterback, Lawrence, to their former stout defense has been subject to criticism in both the media and around the football world. And, as we know, when things go south the head coach is the one sent packing.
Is Pederson going to last the season or be fired on black Monday, the day after the conclusion of the regular season, seems to be the only question left.
Unless, of course, his Jaguars show a late season spark and finish strong while beginning this week with the worst record in the league.
I’m betting on a spark, and I think that will begin ignition this week with a home upset win over the Houston Texans.
Qoxhi Picks: Jacksonville Jaguars (+4) over Houston Texans