Recent history says keeping Zac is a mistake

[Bengalholic]

Since 2000, Zac is the 11th coach to have 5 or less wins in each season of his first 2 full seasons.

Of the previous 10, 6 were fired after their 2nd year was finished, and 2 were fired during their 3rd season.

The only 2 that lasted beyond their 3rd year were Capers with the expansion Texans, and Bradley with the Jags. Neither had any winning seasons or lasted past a 4th year. 

Even if you're generous and expand it to 6 wins or less in each of a coaches first 2 full seasons (which happened 24 times), it's only slightly better and that's because of Kyle Shanahan, who made it to a SB in year 3, but still has 3 losing seasons in 4 years...and Norv Turner, who lasted 7 years with the Redskins and had 3 winning seasons. The overall results are still very depressing.

This is why - IMO and despite the last 2 games - bringing Zac back is going to be a mistake, even though it's obvious he will be back. It just doesn't work out. 

[XenoMorph]

(12-30-2020, 04:18 PM)Bengalholic Wrote: Since 2000, Zac is the 11th coach to have 5 or less wins in each season of his first 2 full seasons.

Of the previous 10, 6 were fired after their 2nd year was finished, and 2 were fired during their 3rd season.

The only 2 that lasted beyond their 3rd year were Capers with the expansion Texans, and Bradley with the Jags. Neither had any winning seasons or lasted past a 4th year. 

Even if you're generous and expand it to 6 wins or less in each of a coaches first 2 full seasons (which happened 24 times), it's only slightly better and that's because of Kyle Shanahan, who made it to a SB in year 3, but still has 3 losing seasons in 4 years...and Norv Turner, who lasted 7 years with the Redskins and had 3 winning seasons. The overall results are still very depressing.

This is why - IMO and despite the last 2 games - bringing Zac back is going to be a mistake, even though it's obvious he will be back. It just doesn't work out. 

well if he returns we all hope he doesnt fall in line with these guys...

Can only judge based on whats been shown though.

[*Nate (formerly eliminate08)*]

(12-30-2020, 04:18 PM)Bengalholic Wrote: Since 2000, Zac is the 11th coach to have 5 or less wins in each season of his first 2 full seasons.

Of the previous 10, 6 were fired after their 2nd year was finished, and 2 were fired during their 3rd season.

The only 2 that lasted beyond their 3rd year were Capers with the expansion Texans, and Bradley with the Jags. Neither had any winning seasons or lasted past a 4th year. 

Even if you're generous and expand it to 6 wins or less in each of a coaches first 2 full seasons (which happened 24 times), it's only slightly better and that's because of Kyle Shanahan, who made it to a SB in year 3, but still has 3 losing seasons in 4 years...and Norv Turner, who lasted 7 years with the Redskins and had 3 winning seasons. The overall results are still very depressing.

This is why - IMO and despite the last 2 games - bringing Zac back is going to be a mistake, even though it's obvious he will be back. It just doesn't work out. 

Agree, bringing back Taylor is a monumental mistake. It just wastes another year for Burrow. Similar to Marv, Taylor cannot 
outcoach good coaches which is what we need to win in the Playoffs. Taylor is even worse than Marv record wise by a large 
margin his first 2 years. Sure, Taylor has beat 2 top teams this season in the Titans and Steelers but the way his teams just 
lose in close games isn't a positive to me.

I will give him reps for finally putting together 2 straight wins lol

Bottom line, if we brought in a proven HC to work with these players we would be much better off.

[*Wyche'sWarrior*]

We ain't paying for no proven coach around these here parts....

[wildcatnku24]

It's no surprise, but I think ZT is gonna make a believer outta ya'll next year. It takes more than one year to fix the BS that he started with. This city is broken in terms of professional sports. It's gonna take some work. We knew that before, we need to know that now.

[THE PISTONS]

(12-30-2020, 05:35 PM)wildcatnku24 Wrote: It's no surprise, but I think ZT is gonna make a believer outta ya'll next year.  It takes more than one year to fix the BS that he started with.  This city is broken in terms of professional sports.  It's gonna take some work.  We knew that before, we need to know that now.

The only reason the roster looks like it needs a complete rebuild is because the coaching has been VERY bad. Zac inherited a 6 win team. He then won 2 games. Added the 1st pick of the draft. Higgins. Jonah returned. Signed Reader, Bynes, Bell, XSF, Spain...and we have 4.5 wins.

The Dolphins intentionally traded their good young players and have 10 wins a year later! This notion that it takes half a decade to rebuild a roster just isn't accurate.

I mean, if you give a coach enough years...eventually they'll turn out a .500 season.

What will success for Zac be? Is it 8-8? Is it 10-6? Is it a playoff win? <---These are all routine things for other franchise's.

[J24]

I would fire him and replace him with Robert Salah if it were up to me.

[wildcatnku24]

(12-30-2020, 05:49 PM)THE PISTONS Wrote: The only reason the roster looks like it needs a complete rebuild is because the coaching has been VERY bad. Zac inherited a 6 win team. He then won 2 games. Added the 1st pick of the draft. Higgins. Jonah returned. Signed Reader, Bynes, Bell, XSF, Spain...and we have 4.5 wins.

The Dolphins intentionally traded their good young players and have 10 wins a year later! This notion that it takes half a decade to rebuild a roster just isn't accurate.

I mean, if you give a coach enough years...eventually they'll turn out a .500 season.

What will success for Zac be? Is it 8-8? Is it 10-6? Is it a playoff win? <---These are all routine things for other franchise's.

Flores is a hell of a coach, and I don't even wanna argue that one.  Ha!  

But I would say I thought Zac built a hell of a competitive team in the offseason.  His plan even made sense, which was to build a defense that would stop the run and stop missing tackles, and then he built an offense (including thru the draft) that would be able to attack.  

Even with the injuries aside, for me ZT passed the eye test in terms of being a fan on the couch watching the Bengals this year.  Prior to Burrow going down, I was actually not ready to turn it off at halftime, I was not slumped in my couch seat just reading my phone with it on in the background, I was watching the Bengals play competitive football!  

And no, I am not defending ZT for an 8-8 season or anything like that.  I think he will take us to the promised land.  Sure, it's faith and it certainly ain't based on his W/L stats, but I just like what I've seen and do believe we're in for some brighter days ahead.  

If next year is a dud, you'll see me at the front gates of the castle with a pitchfork, first in line :) 

[*bengalfan74*]

All these two wins have done for me is make the fire Zac needle which was begged on 10 barely wiggle and fall back to 9.8994.

I'm in no way convinced the light suddenly came on for him. More likely just the blind squirrel/nut thing. Now if we beat the Ravens I may reconsider and move the needle to 9.7762 ?

[Hammerstripes]

The 5 win stat is a little dicey for me as we surely would have had 6-7 wins if Burrow hand't gotten hurt, but either way, I don't know that keeping Taylor is a great idea.

The only reason he is going to stay is because Burrow looked great as rookie and the team really plays hard for him. If he can fix his staff, he might be a pretty good coach

[GreenCornBengal]

I do feel a bit bad for the guy. He’s in a tough situation here in the AFCN. Combined record of his divisional opponents is 32-13... but it doesn’t excuse his failures against the NFCE.

It’s prob a mistake but meh that’s what Bengal football is all about, right?!

[masterpanthera_t]

Is Taylor the guy who beat Pit and Hou, the last two weeks or is the guy who went 0-3-1 against the NFCE, and got the team clobbered against Pit and Bal earlier in the season? I lean towards the latter.

I wish they would bring in Eberflus as the HC, with whoever he picks as his coordinators and assistant coaches.

[SladeX]

I learned, the hard way, that one of my boss's jobs was to keep me from doing too much, by saying "no" to me to keep me from burning myself out. I loved what I did, but found out when I was on my own that I needed a governor on my inclinations to overdo it.

This was part of Zach's job with a rookie at QB. He failed miserably, and worse yet, has not admitted his mistake, at least not to my knowledge. Which doesn't bode well for Joe next year, if this sh!thead is retained.

Before you start, my criterion for success this season was not tied to wins and losses. But one important one was that the coaching staff shows an ability to learn from their mistakes. Not seeing it, in this all important regard..... . If I have missed something Zach said, then that might change things in my mind.

[fredtoast]

A 4 win team just had a season high in yards gained (488) against us and some fans are impressed with how much Taylor has improved over the season?

[*TheLeonardLeap*]

(12-30-2020, 06:25 PM)Hammerstripes Wrote: The 5 win stat is a little dicey for me as we surely would have had 6-7 wins if Burrow hand't gotten hurt, but either way, I don't know that keeping Taylor is a great idea.

The only reason he is going to stay is because Burrow looked great as rookie and the team really plays hard for him.  If he can fix his staff, he might be a pretty good coach

Except why did Burrow get hurt? Because of a bad OL and a bad offensive playcaller. That's part and parcel of some of the reasons this team is bad. Most of us had already seen before the start of the season that Burrow wasn't going to last behind the OL they were going to trot out there, and most of us saw him throw 61 attempts in Week 2 and knew that having him throw that much was going to make the problem even worse.

Sure enough, he had thrown 34 passes in barely over a half (a half and 3:19) and got hurt because of a terrible player who didn't belong starting on an NFL field.

Can't talk about imaginary wins if you're refusing to acknowledge the real issues that made those wins impossible to get. 

[Bengalholic]

(12-30-2020, 07:23 PM)fredtoast Wrote: A 4 win team just had a season high in yards gained (488) against us and some fans are impressed with how much Taylor has improved over the season?

Yeah, the guy has a .114 win % in non-December games - .114! He's done practically nothing in each of his 2 years until the season is completely down the crapper, then he wins a couple of late season games.

[Bengalholic]

(12-30-2020, 06:25 PM)Hammerstripes Wrote: The 5 win stat is a little dicey for me as we surely would have had 6-7 wins if Burrow hand't gotten hurt, but either way, I don't know that keeping Taylor is a great idea.

The only reason he is going to stay is because Burrow looked great as rookie and the team really plays hard for him.  If he can fix his staff, he might be a pretty good coach

Even if you bump it to 6 wins or less in the first 2 years, since 2000, 15 of the 24 coaches didn't make it past year 3. Of the 9 who did, 6 didn't make it past a 4th. Turner had 7 (3 winning years), Schwartz had 5 (1 winning year) and Kyle Shanahan.

The overall results are just aren't good at all when a coach starts out with such a bad record in the last 20 years.

[*Nately120*]

(12-30-2020, 05:35 PM)wildcatnku24 Wrote: It's no surprise, but I think ZT is gonna make a believer outta ya'll next year.  It takes more than one year to fix the BS that he started with.  This city is broken in terms of professional sports.  It's gonna take some work.  We knew that before, we need to know that now.

ZT and Adam Gase have both clearly "gotten it" in these past few weeks and will be vying for the AFC Championship in 2021.  Book it.*








*don't book it



On a related note, we've lost a bunch of close games and the Chiefs have managed to go 14-1 by winning 7 close games. Does anyone think we are a few "lucky bounces" away from being on their level? Ok, I sound like a bitter jerk now. ZT was coming back next year anyways, may as well have some wins to go with the already made decision.

[Bengalitis]

I would fire Zac because that's his destiny.

[*Nately120*]

(12-30-2020, 09:57 PM)Bengalitis Wrote: I would fire Zac because that's his destiny.

His destiny is also likely to be the guy we mention when we talk about being too hasty to fire a mediocre HC.  During the Marvin years it was "Yeah, we COULD fire Marvin, but what if we hire the next Bruce Coslet/Dave Shula?"  I think Zac Taylor could be the guy who replaces them as the example.