Zac Taylor’s seat is warm, but a few other NFL coaches are sitting in far hotter spots after Week 8.
Cincinnati’s 5-2 record and a 43-36 overtime win over the 1-7 Tennessee Titans have Taylor in a relatively safe place for now, even with the scrutiny that follows him around. The bigger question hanging over the Bengals is whether he can push the program beyond what he has already reached.
He has gotten Cincinnati to a Super Bowl and another AFC title game, but there’s still a sense that the next step remains elusive. Taylor is under contract through only 2027, and the urgency around the Bengals is only getting louder.
Still, if the conversation is about coaches who could be out before Taylor, the list starts with a few names in rough shape.
Jim Harbaugh’s first two seasons with the Los Angeles Chargers ended in playoff trips, but the bottom has fallen out in a hurry. Justin Herbert struggled badly in both of those one-and-done appearances, and the offense never found the right mix.
Harbaugh tried to bring in Mike McDaniel and spark the unit, but the Chargers don’t have the perimeter talent, the interior offensive line, or the right style of quarterback to make it work. Add in a defense that lost elite coordinator Jesse Minter to the Ravens after last season, and the result is an 0-7 team with no obvious answers.
The situation has gotten so strange that even a full teardown has been floated. The idea is that the Chargers could become deadline sellers, with the Bengals potentially benefiting by landing someone like Tuli Tuipolotu.
But Harbaugh and GM Joe Hortiz don’t seem to be treating the season that way. As Noah Furtado reported in The Athletic, “While other struggling teams have embraced themselves as deadline sellers, Hortiz has refused to see his team in that light, according to The Athletic’s reporting in recent weeks.
‘The Chargers have confounded teams by not engaging in trade talks,’ Jonathan Jones wrote over the weekend. Outsiders wouldn’t understand.
The Chargers aren’t supposed to be 0-7. As far as the fast-approaching Nov. 10 trade deadline is concerned, they aren’t.”
Nick Sirianni is also in a dangerous spot in Philadelphia. The Eagles have won a Super Bowl under him, but the roster has been carrying plenty of the load.
Howie Roseman has built elite teams, while Sirianni has cycled through offensive coordinators and still hasn’t taken over play-calling duties himself. That has become a glaring issue.
The Eagles are 2-6, and the combination of Jalen Hurts’ blood clot situation and an offensive line on the verge of collapse gives the organization a convenient off-ramp if it wants one.
A league source put it bluntly: “This [Eagles] team is going to look very different come the bye… it’s a loss that loses people their job.”
“They just got their a** kicked back to back weeks in primetime, there will be changes.”
Aaron Glenn’s first season with the New York Jets has also gone sideways. The former Jets player came in with the kind of backstory that could have made for a perfect turnaround, but the results haven’t followed. The Bills and Patriots are already well ahead in the AFC East, and the Jets’ spending spree in free agency, plus three first-round picks, hasn’t produced much of anything.
Glenn’s personality has also rubbed some people the wrong way, especially in press conferences that come off as confrontational. On the field, the offensive setup hasn’t helped.
Hiring Frank Reich as offensive coordinator was a choice, and while Geno Smith has been able to overcome some of that, the Jets are still last in red zone touchdown percentage at 42.3%. That points more toward coaching and scheme than quarterback failure.
The record says plenty too. Glenn is 5-20, and at this point he doesn’t look like a coach who is elevating a program.
In Other News...
Bengals Could Face A Tough Trade Deadline Decision On Their Own Roster
The Bengals are expected to be active around the NFL trade deadline, and the reason is pretty straightforward: injuries have left them looking for help at linebacker and in the secondary. That usually puts a team in buyer mode, but it also changes the conversation inside the building, where depth pieces and young talent suddenly become part of the calculus as Cincinnati weighs both its needs and its long-term roster picture.
Several names on the Bengals' roster are already being floated as possible trade candidates, even if the team may not be eager to part with them. Other clubs are always looking for value when the deadline nears, and Cincinnati's current injury situation only adds to the scrutiny, but the front office also has to decide how much it is willing to sacrifice from a roster it still believes in. [Read more 🡒]
Bengals Still Have One Problem Keeping Doubters Loud
The Bengals walked out of Week 8 with an overtime win over Tennessee, but the messiness around it did little to quiet the outside noise. Cincinnati survived multiple turnovers and another uneven day on defense, the kind of performance that has kept the conversation around this team focused less on the standings and more on whether it can ever put together a clean 60 minutes.
Joe Burrow and the offense still give Cincinnati a ceiling that keeps it in the national conversation, and the defense has enough talent to suggest better days are possible. Still, the perception problem lingers because the slow starts and first-half struggles keep showing up in the same places, leaving the Bengals with a win that mattered and a reputation issue they have not solved yet. [Read more 🡒]
Bengals May Have A Dalton Risner Problem They Didnt Expect
Dalton Risner has given the Bengals exactly what they hoped for when they brought him in as an interior offensive line answer. He has settled in well, drawn praise for his professionalism, and helped stabilize a unit that has needed dependable play inside, with his work showing up in both pass protection and the run game.
The tricky part for Cincinnati is that Risners value may be rising at the same time the team has more decisions looming on the offensive line. A player who arrived as a short-term fix can quickly turn into someone the Bengals need to keep, and his situation is now part of a broader offseason puzzle that could force the front office to choose which linemen it can afford to retain. [Read more 🡒]