FootballOutsider's just had a piece talking about how strongly a coach's first 8 games correlate with the rest of their record.
https://www.footballoutsiders.com/scramble/2019/scramble-ball-stuck-starting-line
tl;wr A new HC's record in his first 8 games has good (not great) correlation with who he is as a coach with that team.
1) 6/8 new HC's have a record of 2-6 or worse. That's the worst start of new HCs beating out 2009's 5 of Todd Haley, Jim Schwartz, Rahee Morris, Eric Mangini and Steve Spagnuolo.
2) Bill Walsh went 2-14, Parcell's 3-12-1, Tom Landry 0-11-1, Jimmy Johnson 1-15.
Even great coaches can struggle! Except all these turnarounds happened in the 20th century before free agency, the salary cap, or a host of other things that encourage parity.
3) There is a 65% correlation with a coach's win% their first 8 games and their overall tenure.
4) Corellation is affected by extremes. Going 0-8 pr 8-0 is unsustainable over a tenure. This is also why they use median not average.
5) There are some "fraud" coaches (Jim Zorn went 6-2, McDaniels 6-2, Todd Bowles 5-3) and "sleepers" (Belichick 2-6, Shanahan 0-8, Dungy (IND) 4-4).
6) You should factor in team's previous record. But also factor in regression to the mean. That is, you would expect a 5-11 team to win about 6 or 7 games the next year.
FO's projections for Bucs in 2019? 6.0 wins.
7) On Arians specifically:
Andrew: By contrast, Kingsbury and LaFleur are in good shape, having both already surpassed last year's record. Vic Fangio is on shaky ground, but a second-half recovery is at least plausible. Bruce Arians will probably get as long as he can stomach in Tampa Bay, which I believe is unlikely to be all that long.
Conclusion:
Andrew: So what do we take from this, overall? Maybe not too much. Half a season is a very small sample. Still, I think my initial impression is vindicated: if a head coach is particularly good, that will show up somewhere in the win column even on a talent-starved roster. If he's going 1-7 or worse, your next successful coach is probably not the guy you currently have in charge. Not a revelation -- there will always be more unsuccessful coaches than successful ones -- but still nice to have some data on the subject.
