The NFL typically overshadows most other sports stories on Sunday afternoons during the fall, but Penn State's decision to fire coach James Franklin was an exception to that rule. Fifteen days ago, Franklin's Nittany Lions were the No. 3-ranked team in college football. But after three straight losses, the university decided that it was better off paying Franklin a buyout of about $50 million and hiring someone else to run the football program.
With UAB coach Trent Dilfer also getting fired on Sunday, the college football hot seat has officially been turned on. The same is true for the NFL, where the vast majority of the league's teams are now six games into the season. It's tougher for a coach, player or executive to treat a slow start or a rough patch of form like it's a temporary concern this far into the season.
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Let's talk today about the NFL hot seat. Should time be up for embattled coaches or overwhelmed quarterbacks? What needs to change for them to turn things around? I'll run through some of the most tenuous positions around the league, starting in Miami, where the players are even arguing in public that they need more leadership.
Jump to:
McDaniel | Fields | Karty | Ringo
Harbaugh | Callahan | Hubbard
Mike McDaniel, coach, Miami Dolphins
Week 6: Lost 29-27 to the Chargers, dropping the Dolphins to 1-5.
For a moment there, it looked like the Dolphins might get out alive. Reeling after a 17-point third quarter opened the game up for the Chargers, the Dolphins fought back. De'Von Achane's second touchdown of the game made it 26-20 with eight minutes to go, and after the Chargers went four-and-out, the Dolphins drove downfield and scored another touchdown with 52 seconds left, taking a 27-26 lead. All McDaniel needed was one stop from his defense to seal up a home victory over a team leading the AFC West.
That stop didn't come. On the second play of the ensuing drive, Jaelan Phillips and Chop Robinson immediately beat the right side of the Chargers' line, but Justin Herbert simply refused to go down and found Ladd McConkey on a shallow route. The only Dolphins player in the area was rookie safety Dante Trader Jr., who couldn't even get close enough to miss a tackle attempt on McConkey. While the Chargers wideout inexplicably finished the play out of bounds, the 44 yards McConkey picked up put the Chargers in field goal range, from which they sealed a 29-27 victory.
If the loss felt crushing, what happened after the game might have been even more painful. Tua Tagovailoa criticized the team's leadership for not clearly articulating expectations and added that members of the team have been late or have not shown up at all for players-only meetings.
McDaniel noted that those meetings are outside his purview and felt like players were accountable to him, but that seems to be up for debate. ESPN's Marcel Louis-Jacques reported, per one former Dolphins player, that players were regularly late to meetings and practices throughout McDaniel's tenure with the team, only for those concerns to be ignored as the Dolphins won football games.
Of course, when it comes to leadership and accountability, it's difficult to ignore what happened in Week 18 a little less than a year ago, when Tyreek Hill refused to enter a game against the Jets and hinted he was open to leaving the team afterward. The Dolphins essentially memory-holed that afternoon, not punishing Hill for what would be regarded as a potential career-ending act for a lesser player. (Note that nobody signed linebacker De'Vondre Campbell this offseason after he refused to enter a game for the 49ers last season.) It's not uncommon for teams to have different rules for star players, but if that situation wasn't going to have any repercussions, why would any of this team's notable players feel any concern about being late to a meeting?
Hill's tenure with the team is likely done after the wide receiver sustained a severe knee injury while also facing allegations of domestic abuse, but the problems remain. And while the Dolphins were able to overcome whatever discipline or defensive problems they had in the past by thriving on offense, they haven't been able to put together a complete performance all season. Ironically, this was comfortably the best performance of the season for the much-maligned run game, with Achane running for 128 yards and two touchdowns on 16 carries, including a 49-yard scamper in the first quarter.
Tagovailoa and the passing game weren't consistent. He threw three picks, though one was bobbled by Jaylen Waddle and another was picked at the beginning of what would likely be an attempted gadget or trick play with five seconds to go. Waddle made a spectacular juggling catch along the sideline for 45 yards, but he seemed to expect a pass over one shoulder and got it over the other. When pressured, Tagovailoa was 1-of-6 for 10 yards and an interception. Herbert was 7-of-13 for 105 yards in those spots, including the game-sealing throw to McConkey. That was the difference in the game.
It's difficult to separate McDaniel's imprint on the offense from his players. The Miami offense has actually been a little better than you might think this season, with the Dolphins currently 12th in EPA per play on that side of the ball, just behind the Rams. That's with Hill sidelined for the year and the Dolphins getting one game from right tackle Austin Jackson, who serves as the team's blindside protector for its lefty quarterback.
But an offense that used to look like it was ahead of the curve and perennially inventing new concepts for the rest of the league might have grown a bit stale. McDaniel is revered around the league for his run game and play design, but the Dolphins ran for just 19 yards against the Panthers in Week 5. The fury of run-pass options and in-breakers that created so many quick, safe completions for Tagovailoa haven't been as easy to find, and he is averaging 2.7 seconds before his pass attempts, which is the 11th-fastest rate in the league. Tagovailoa got rid of the ball at the fastest rate in the NFL in 2023 (2.36 seconds) and 2024 (2.42 seconds), but those windows aren't open as rapidly anymore. Tagovailoa is having to work harder for worse results.
While I put this side of the problem more on general manager Chris Grier than McDaniel, there has been a general mismanagement of the draft picks the Dolphins had to work with after the Laremy Tunsil and Trey Lance deals. The Dolphins traded picks to acquire guys such as Hill, Bradley Chubb and Jalen Ramsey, with only the Hill deal standing out as a success. Miami guaranteed two years of Ramsey's contract as part of his trade, gave him a new deal the following season, and then traded him before that extension even kicked in.
Meanwhile, the Dolphins let young cornerstone players such as Robert Hunt, Christian Wilkins and Jevon Holland leave in free agency. They brought in Vic Fangio and then fired the lauded defensive coordinator after one season. While Anthony Weaver has done a solid job since joining Miami, Fangio went to the Eagles and won a Super Bowl, completely turning around Philly's defense along the way. This version of the Dolphins doesn't look great on paper and hasn't played great in reality.
The McDaniel case does remind me a little bit of what Baker Mayfield said last week. Asked about how perceptions have changed as he has grown in the league, Mayfield noted that he has always been the same person, but that the narratives surrounding him changed as his play improved and declined. When Mayfield was struggling, he was called cocky and immature, but when he is playing well, those character traits are reframed as positives. He's not wrong.
It seems the same thing is happening with McDaniel. He was always an offensive-first coach who was hired because of his ability to get Tagovailoa going after the quarterback's slow start under former coach Brian Flores. That worked. McDaniel is the same guy, but it seems like Dolphins fans have either realized or decided, depending on who you ask, that he's not capable of doing anything more than getting their beloved team to the wild-card round.
Tristan Cockcroft explains why Justin Fields remains a matchup-driven option after his lowest fantasy output of the season.
Per ESPN's Football Power Index, Miami's playoff odds fell to 2.0% after the loss, and history would tell us that Dolphins owner Stephen Ross wouldn't look kindly on anything short of a stunning turnaround. Since Ross bought the team in 2008, no Dolphins head coach has made it through four full seasons in the job. Tony Sparano was fired after starting 4-9 in Year 4, while Joe Philbin went down after a 1-3 opening to his fourth season. Adam Gase and Flores were each fired after three seasons in charge.
With the reports of a lack of player discipline and visible sections of empty seats at home in Miami, the clock has to be ticking on McDaniel's tenure. The good news? The Dolphins are about to leave town for a two-game road trip with winnable games against the Browns and Falcons. Then again, winnable games against the Jets and Panthers were supposed to get the Dolphins back on track. But after beating the Jets, the Dolphins lost to the Panthers and fell at home to a banged-up Chargers team. It doesn't feel like things are safe for the 42-year-old coach.
Justin Fields, QB, New York Jets
Week 6: Went 9-of-17 for 45 yards with nine sacks in a 13-11 loss to the Broncos.
Minus-10 net passing yards. While Fields threw for 45 yards in London on Sunday, the nine sacks he took at the hands of a brutally efficient Broncos defense set the Jets backward. Leaving his scrambles aside, Fields generated minus-0.4 yards per dropback as a passer. It's the first time any quarterback has generated negative net yards on a day with 20 dropbacks or more since Jay Cutler did it against the Giants in 2010. The Jets would have been better off spiking the ball 26 times, a move that would have offered more entertainment value than what they actually did on offense.
The Jets won't be handed many better opportunities to win a game than what they saw Sunday. Facing a Broncos team that might have been lulled to sleep by Sean Payton telling them stories about his time at quarterback for the Leicester Panthers, the Jets were handed two short fields to start the game thanks to a Denver fumble and a 72-yard kick return. Those drives produced a total of 4 net yards and two field goals. The Jets' defense, which had been the league's worst in a 17-game sample since firing Robert Saleh by both EPA per play and points per drive, held the Broncos to 13 points on 11 meaningful drives. The unit even contributed two points by drawing a safety on a holding call in the end zone.
Harry Douglas explains the biggest issues with the Eagles' offense after Philadelphia lost its second straight game.
Yet Fields and the offense could do absolutely nothing to take advantage of those opportunities. Seven of their 12 possessions failed to produce first downs, and the Jets had just two drives produce 20 or more net yards. Most of that came on the ground, where Breece Hall gritted through 22 carries for 59 yards. Fields added seven carries for 31 yards. I normally wouldn't treat a backfield averaging 3.0 yards per carry as a mark of success, but the running game looked like prime Adrian Peterson and LaDainian Tomlinson compared to what the dropback passing game did for the Jets.
It's fair to note that this posed a particularly tough matchup for the Jets. The Broncos are one of the league's best defenses, full stop. They have a superstar CB1 in Pat Surtain II. But teams do find plenty of success throwing against Riley Moss and Denver's other defensive backs. Vance Joseph's linebackers can also struggle in coverage, and the Eagles were able to exploit them last week, most notably on a 47-yard touchdown catch by Saquon Barkley.
Well, the Jets didn't have those solutions. Garrett Wilson went up against Surtain on 62% of his routes, catching one pass for 4 yards. The only running back to catch a pass was Isaiah Davis, who turned his one target into minus-1 yard. Hall was so promising as a receiver that this offseason Aaron Glenn called him the kind of guy who "you can split out wide and let him run the route tree, because he can run it like a receiver." He had zero targets on 14 routes. (Hall has run a total of three routes split out wide in six games. When a coach tells you over the summer that his running back is going to split out wide and run a full route tree, just know that that coach is likely either lying to you or himself, and you'll find out which soon enough.)
With his one star receiver blanketed by the opposing team's star cornerback, Fields wasn't able to find answers. Doing the broadcast, Kurt Warner repeatedly noted that Fields was late throwing out-breaking routes, even when Surtain was in coverage. Whether that's on Fields (for being nervous about throwing to the sideline or throwing with anticipation) or on Jets offensive coordinator Tanner Engstrand (for dialing up speed outs that Fields wouldn't be willing to throw) is hard to say, but the Jets weren't in position to turn down anything in the passing game Sunday.
While nine sacks sound like the work of a dominant pass rush, I would say that only one or two of those sacks really erased the play before Fields had a chance to do anything. Every one of Fields' sacks came five seconds or more after the snap. And the two sacks on the final drive were both problematic.
Fields actually had two receivers coming open on a first-and-10 sack in Denver territory with 1:56 to go, but he turned down an out to the sideline and then didn't have time to get to the backside of the play. Then, facing fourth-and-8 with the game on the line, Tyler Johnson had a step on Ja'Quan McMillian and an angle to the sideline, but Fields didn't throw the ball with anticipation. And when he held the ball, Jonathon Cooper's rush through Mason Taylor blew up the play.
Fourth and the game for the Jets. Tyler Johnson has a step and good leverage on this out-breaking route, and Fields is looking over there - this throw has to come out with anticipation, but when Fields doesn't throw it, there's nowhere to go with the ball. pic.twitter.com/H0ifQibrUn
— Bill Barnwell (@billbarnwell) October 13, 2025
Fields was excellent in Week 1 against the Steelers, but his only effective passing work since then has come while trailing against the Cowboys. Since Week 2, if we just look at plays that took place with a win expectancy of 20% or more, Fields' 10.7 QBR is the worst mark in the league. The average Fields dropback in those situations has generated 2.1 yards, a figure that includes both sacks and scrambles.
It's clear that Glenn doesn't trust his quarterback. The Jets coach bungled a pair of fourth-down situations out of fear that he might have to rely on his offense, including a brutal process on a fourth-and-1 while the Jets were clinging on to a one-point lead in the fourth quarter.
I was optimistic about Fields after the Steelers game in the opener, but he looked completely lost in this game against the Broncos. The problem for the winless Jets in potentially benching their starter, unfortunately, is there's not much to gain. Fields is already owed $10 million in guarantees next year as part of the $30 million he locked down in his deal with the Jets, so there are economic reasons to hope that he can turn things around.
The backup here is Tyrod Taylor, who is 36 years old. I'm as big of a Taylor fan as anyone, but in 16 starts over the past seven years since leaving the Bills, Taylor has posted a 43.3 QBR, which ranks 63rd out of the 72 quarterbacks with 500 dropbacks or more over that span. (Fields' 47.4 mark is 47th.) Taylor would likely do a better job running the offense and making some of the throws that are available, but that would come at the expense of the explosiveness and big-play ability that Fields offers with his legs.
The Jets would be trading a low-floor, high-ceiling quarterback for one a decade older with a moderate floor and virtually no ceiling. I wouldn't like that swap, but the Jets also probably win this game if Taylor is at quarterback. And after starting 0-6, the idea of being in position to win anything might appeal to Glenn and the Jets.
Joshua Karty, K, Los Angeles Rams
Week 6: Went 1-for-2 on field goals (missing a 26-yarder) in a 17-3 win over the Ravens.
It's rare to have a kicker make it into back-to-back Monday columns, but this is quickly becoming a topic of concern for the Rams. In what might be Matthew Stafford's final NFL season, it's clear that Sean McVay's team has championship aspirations. While Sunday wasn't Stafford's best game, the 37-year-old has been up to that level for most of the 2025 season. The Rams have a pair of great receivers and a young, imposing defensive line. It's becoming clear, though, that their kicking operation is not up to the same standard.
This has been a topsy-turvy year for Karty, who has played a key role in each of Los Angeles' losses this season. The second-year kicker had two field goals blocked in what ended up being a fateful loss to the Eagles. While I wouldn't necessarily pin that on Karty, he then missed a 53-yarder against the 49ers last week before having an extra point blocked and placing his overtime kickoff short of the end zone, handing San Francisco a short field on its drive for the game-winning field goal.
In what were admittedly rainy, windy conditions in Baltimore on Sunday, Karty appeared to wear out his welcome. After Stafford missed Davante Adams twice in a row for potential touchdowns on the opening drive of the game, Karty lined up for a chip shot from 26 yards out, only for the wind to push his kick into the right upright. Kickers just don't miss in that range anymore, and unlike the Eagles game, there was no pressure or penetration from the Ravens' defense to hurry the kick.
The Rams seemed to lean away from the kicking game after that point. Karty did kick a 36-yard field goal on the next drive, but it was on a fourth-and-11 in the red zone. McVay was more aggressive than usual as the game went along. The Rams attempted a fourth-and-2 on the Baltimore 33-yard line on their opening drive of the third quarter and a fourth-and-3 from the Baltimore 6-yard line early in the fourth.
As is often the case when coaches are forced to be more aggressive than they would like, the results were actually slightly positive! The fourth-and-2 in the third quarter produced a 30-yard completion to Kyren Williams, who then punched in the first touchdown of the game on the next snap. The fourth-and-3 failed when Stafford was sacked, but the touchdown more than offset what the Rams would've gotten had they kicked field goals in both spots.
Could McVay have been concerned about the weather in making his kicking game decisions? Potentially. After the game, though, it was telling that he offered a comment without even being asked a question by the assembled media. "Obviously, you guys are going to ask me about about the field goal," McVay said. "I thought the protection was good, [but] we have to make the kick." McVay then went on to criticize the operation on the subsequent made field goal, which implies that he places the blame for the initial miss solely on his kicker.
The Rams were 20th in the league in performance on field goal and extra point tries last season, per the FTN Football Almanac. They're unsurprisingly last in EPA per attempt and win probability on those kicks in 2025. Some of that doesn't fall on Karty's shoulders given the blocks, but nothing about his performance so far as a pro suggests that the Rams are dealing with a championship-caliber kicker.
I also wonder whether McVay is looking over at his friends and rivals in San Francisco. Kyle Shanahan and the 49ers were keeping the faith in a kicker they drafted in the third round in 2023, sticking with Jake Moody into the start of the 2025 season even after a disappointing 2024 campaign. Once Moody went 1-of-3 on field goal attempts in the opener, though, the 49ers cut him and replaced him with Eddy Pineiro. The journeyman has proceeded to go 15-of-15 on field goal tries since, including four kicks from 50-plus yards -- most notably the 59-yarder that gave the 49ers a lead late in the fourth quarter over the Rams last week.
Kelee Ringo, CB, Philadelphia Eagles
Week 6: Allowed three catches for 69 yards as the nearest defender in coverage in a 34-17 loss to the Giants, per NFL Next Gen Stats.
Howie Roseman's draft philosophy over the past few years has been brutally effective: Find a Georgia Bulldogs defender, draft him and profit. The Eagles' general manager has cleaned up on Georgia players, adding Jalen Carter, Jordan Davis, Nakobe Dean and Nolan Smith Jr. to one of the league's best young defensive front sevens. He even signed Azeez Ojulari away from the Giants in free agency, adding a fifth former Bulldog to the defense.
The one who hasn't quite worked out is Ringo. Roseman traded a 2024 third-round pick to acquire Ringo in the fourth round of the 2023 draft, the sort of impatient move the veteran GM usually prefers to be on the other side of making. Ringo wasn't involved on defense in 2023 until the late-season collapse, and with Quinyon Mitchell and Cooper DeJean emerging as stars in 2024, he averaged about four defensive snaps per game outside of a rest day for the starters in Week 18.
After trading Darius Slay away during the offseason, the Eagles have flirted with different options on the outside at cornerback. Ringo was torched by Ja'Marr Chase in the preseason, which might have steered Vic Fangio to start Adoree' Jackson in the opener. After three games, Jackson was pulled for Ringo, who started each of the next two weeks. (Jackson was brought back into the fold when Mitchell went down injured Thursday against the Giants.)
Ringo didn't have the best performance against the Giants. Early in the game, with New York facing a third-and-12, Ringo was outjumped on a 50-50 ball by Lil'Jordan Humphrey, who picked up 34 yards on the play. Wan'Dale Robinson ran away from Ringo on a crosser for 26 yards. An illegal contact penalty handed the Giants a free first down on a drive that eventually ended in a touchdown. And a 20-yard pass interference call against Ringo set the Giants up with a first-and-goal on the 1-yard line, which Cam Skattebo pounded in for another touchdown.
After the pass interference call, the Eagles kept Ringo off the field for most of the fourth quarter, with the third-year pro coming back onto the field for only the final four snaps of the game, three of which were kneel-downs. Ringo himself admitted after the game that he didn't perform well enough, saying that he "didn't play to my standard entirely."
The Eagles can keep the faith with Ringo. They can turn back to Jackson, who was run through on a touchdown by Skattebo and has already essentially been benched once this season. They could eventually look toward Jakorian Bennett, though the summer trade acquisition played just 24 defensive snaps in three games before being placed on injured reserve with a pectoral injury and doesn't have a clear timeframe for returning.
To bring it full circle, though, this is Roseman's team. If there's one thing he's known for besides drafting Georgia defenders, it's making plenty of trades. With the deadline just weeks away and that outside cornerback role across from Mitchell and DeJean continuing to be a liability, would anyone be surprised if the Eagles made a move for a veteran cornerback who could step into the lineup at midseason? I'd expect Roseman to be hitting the phones in search of CB help between now and Nov. 4, which would squeeze Ringo out of a starting role.
Bryon Young chases Tyler Huntley down and sacks him for the Rams late in the 4th.
John Harbaugh, coach, Baltimore Ravens
Week 6: Lost 17-3 to the Rams, dropping the Ravens to 1-5.
Even the league's best coaches have seen many of their legendary tenures come to ignominious ends. Andy Reid was run out of town in Philadelphia by Eagles fans who were convinced their veteran coach would never get them over the Super Bowl hump. Bill Belichick was fired after winning six Super Bowls in New England.
Any coach who doesn't win a Super Bowl over a 12-year span in the same job is going to inspire some grumbling here and there, and every fan base fires its coach on social media after every loss. But Sunday was really the point where frustrations about Harbaugh came to the surface in Baltimore. After a Zay Flowers fumble and a quick touchdown drive by the Rams put the visitors up 17-3 in the third quarter, a notable portion of the crowd launched into a chant that hasn't been heard very often over the past two decades: "Fire Harbaugh."
Of course, I recognize that Ravens fans didn't suddenly decide that they're frustrated with Harbaugh after five losses before the end of October. This is partly about the frustrations of the Lamar Jackson era, where the Ravens have been the best team in football during the regular season and made it past the divisional round only once in seven tries. It is about trying to find something to change about a team that felt as if it was inevitably going to come up short when things mattered most, even before their previously lofty floor collapsed amid a brutal run of injuries.
It is also somewhat about the fact that Harbaugh is one of the league's CEO coaches, which means it's more difficult to tie his performance to one particular side of the ball. If Harbaugh had a background as an offensive or defensive assistant and called plays, it would be easy to marry his job performance to the performance of that unit. With Todd Monken in charge of the offense and Zach Orr running the defense, Harbaugh's most visible when it comes to making fourth-down decisions. And while I agreed with his decisions Sunday, the Ravens failed on four of their six fourth-down attempts against the Rams, including a goal-to-go sequence that ended with Derrick Henry getting stuffed for a loss. That's not going to thrill fans.
Quentin Lake jumps in front of Cooper Rush's throw for the Rams INT.
Having said all that: I believe Harbaugh is a really good coach. The Ravens are 1-5 out of some combination of tough close-game luck against very good competition and a horrific run of injuries. If a pass doesn't deflect into Keon Coleman's hands or Henry doesn't fumble down the stretch in Week 1, is Harbaugh a better coach? Baltimore's rookie class isn't off to a great start, but the Ravens have brought through young talent for many years under Harbaugh with a lot of success. That has to mean something.
Is there something innately lacking in Harbaugh that prevents the Ravens from winning a Super Bowl? I'm not sure I loved that argument with Reid in Philadelphia or with any other consistent playoff-visiting coach who came up short of the Super Bowl without Tom Brady or Patrick Mahomes at quarterback. Regardless, it certainly shouldn't apply to Harbaugh, who actually did win a Super Bowl. And unlike Reid, who started winning them after he landed a future Hall of Famer at quarterback, Harbaugh won his title with something less than the best version of those Ravens teams. His 10-6 squad ran through the AFC as the fourth seed, winning road games in Denver and New England along the way.
I would argue the Ravens and Harbaugh can be a little slow to recognize the need for some changes. Remember the last time Harbaugh's job security was in question? It was 2018, when the Ravens had missed the playoffs in three consecutive seasons and were seemingly about to do so for a fourth consecutive year. Harbaugh had stuck by struggling starter Joe Flacco all season and refused to even publicly consider inserting Jackson, but when Flacco suffered a hip injury, Harbaugh was left with no choice. The 4-5 Ravens went 6-1 the rest of the way with Jackson under center and haven't looked back.
The Ravens should get Jackson back from his hamstring injury after the bye, which should help the offense dramatically. The team has turned the ball over six times in two games after turning it over just 11 times all season in 2024. Monken's offense was operating at a high level before the injury. While the run game needs to get more consistent and Jackson needs to stop taking sacks at triple the rate he did a year ago, I'm not concerned about the offense.
Can the defense get back on track? Harbaugh has already said that he doesn't plan on firing Orr, which means the change will have to come from within. With Kyle Hamilton and Marlon Humphrey returning to the lineup, this Baltimore defense was much improved on what we saw last week against Houston, albeit with the help of some missed passes, difficult weather and a midgame injury to Puka Nacua.
If anything, we could see minor changes. The Ravens swapped Odafe Oweh for Alohi Gilman last week, a reflection on the reality that they just needed responsible adults in the secondary. Gilman played 82% of the snaps in his Ravens debut, which meant much less T.J. Tampa and Keyon Martin. Roquan Smith will be back after the bye and take over for Trenton Simpson. I wouldn't be shocked if the Ravens looked to add a veteran or two off the waiver wire or on the bottom of another team's roster to upgrade their thin defensive line.
Devin White forces Cam Ward to fumble, giving the Raiders possession at the goal line.
The biggest reason things should get better, though, is that the schedule is about to get much easier. After the bye, the Ravens play their next six games against teams that are a combined 9-24. They'll face at least one backup quarterback in Flacco of the Bengals, and it would hardly be a surprise if they faced a couple more along the way owing to likely benchings. There will be a lot of winnable contests ahead.
But if the Ravens lose a bunch of these games to the likes of the Browns, Jets and Dolphins over the next two months? That's a different story. Until then, though, I don't think that Harbaugh's job should be in question. And frankly, as the crowd chanted "Fire Harbaugh" on Sunday, I suspect that there were a few owners and executives around the league who were quietly joining in, hoping that one of the best coaches in football might come available for them to hire.
Brian Callahan, coach, Tennessee Titans
Week 6: Lost 20-10 to the Raiders, dropping the Titans to 1-5.
Last Sunday's win was supposed to be the light at the end of the tunnel. Yes, the Cardinals essentially regurgitated their fourth-quarter lead and handed a victory to the previously winless Titans in Week 5. No, it would be foolish to assume that every team was going to be as indifferent to the football as Arizona was near the end zone. On a day where the Titans' defense slowed down the Cardinals for three quarters and Cam Ward hit a number of big-time throws to Calvin Ridley in key moments, though, Callahan could credibly go to his locker room and say that Titans at least had something to build upon, even if it was built on something resembling a house of cards.
It's still very dark in Nashville. After their dramatic victory, how did the Titans respond? Jeffery Simmons admitted to ESPN's Turron Davenport after the game that the team had one of its worst weeks of practice. They came to Las Vegas to face a reeling Raiders team and went down 17-0 before responding. With Ridley sidelined early on by a hamstring injury, the Titans racked up just 22 net yards on their first five drives before a sixth drive at the end of the second quarter ended with a brutal interception from Ward, who held the ball too long and had his pass tipped.
The offensive line was supposed to be the strength of this team, both by virtue of coaching (legendary coach Bill Callahan, Brian's father, arrived along with his son in 2024) and investment. The Titans used consecutive first-round picks on Peter Skoronski and JC Latham and spent big to sign Lloyd Cushenberry III, Kevin Zeitler and Dan Moore Jr. in free agency. Latham has been out since the opener, and replacement John Ojukwu was arguably playing like the worst player in the league before being benched himself. Still, Latham's return to the lineup was supposed to solidify things Sunday.
Instead, Latham allowed two sacks and six pressures. He appeared to be at fault on a brutal strip sack of Ward in the second quarter, when nobody blocked Devin White as the linebacker rushed through the B-gap, handing the Raiders a short field that led to a touchdown. Playing against Maxx Crosby is tough, but the Titans took Latham with the seventh pick in the draft. They rely on him. He struggled badly in pass protection at left tackle a year ago and has now allowed three sacks in two games on the right side this season. And Moore leads the NFL with six sacks allowed, per NFL Next Gen Stats. Some of that is on Ward, but the Titans can't be too shocked, given that Moore also led the league in sacks allowed last season.
The tough part for Brian Callahan is that he has already ceded responsibilities. His father presumably plays a big role in designing the run game, which ranks 28th in the league in EPA per play on designed runs. He also handed over playcalling duties to Bo Hardegree at 0-3. The offense didn't move much; it was 32nd in EPA per play with Callahan calling the plays and jumped all the way to 30th after the shift, though that's mostly been a product of the Browns and Ravens changing quarterbacks below them.
In terms of game management, it's hard to argue that Callahan has been up to the task. He was involved in a bizarre controversy in Week 1, where he neglected to challenge an incomplete pass call on Titans receiver Elic Ayomanor because he had only an elbow inbounds. (One elbow, as you probably know, equals two feet.) In Week 2, the Titans were lined up for a 57-yard field goal, only for Callahan's indecisiveness to lead to a delay of game penalty, with the ensuing 62-yarder getting blocked. In Week 4, while trailing 26-0 to the Texans and inside his own 5-yard line with 1:50 to go, Callahan handed the ball to Tony Pollard three consecutive times, putting unnecessary hits on the 28-year-old's body.
Callahan's role is likely dependent on how he does developing Ward. Six games isn't an entire picture, but so far, Ward's 25.0 QBR ranks last in the league by a comfortable margin. The guys directly ahead of him have either been benched (Jake Browning, Russell Wilson or Joe Flacco) or seem to be in real danger of losing their job (Geno Smith, Justin Fields).
Ward has a talented arm, and he has made some excellent throws this season, but the Titans haven't done enough to insist that their young QB get the ball out quickly. That has led to pick-sixes, strip sacks and unnecessary hits. Some of Ward's most successful plays have been wildly dangerous passes across his body. Those are fun, but there's no consistency to the Titans' offense. Ward is taking sacks on nearly 11% of his dropbacks, which was supposed to be an area where the Titans would improve after Will Levis was taken down on 12% of his dropbacks in 2024.
Tristan H. Cockcroft breaks down whether Rico Dowdle can maintain his current fantasy output.
All of the easy buttons the Titans should be able to hit for their young quarterback aren't working. They're last in the league in EPA per play on screens at an almost-unbelieveable minus-0.42 mark. On Sunday, their five screens picked up a total of 8 yards. On four of those five screens, there was at least one blown block or major blocking mistake that led to the play not succeeding. Those plays all look good on paper, and the Titans had blocking advantages on a number of them. If the players repeatedly can't or don't execute, is that on them or the coaching staff?
I can see the argument for not forcing a change. Bad organizations get caught in a cycle of swapping out coaches at the first sign of struggles from their young quarterbacks, resulting in a steady stream of new voices, new concepts and unfamiliar rules. Callahan came from Cincinnati, where Zac Taylor was 10-29-1 at the bye of his third season with the team. The Bengals went 5-3 down the stretch, got hot in the postseason and made it to the Super Bowl. They made it to the AFC Championship Game the following season. What has happened since suggests that Taylor probably isn't as good as he looked in 2021 and 2022, but he also wasn't as overmatched as he seemed in 2019 and 2020, either.
Without arguing that the Titans should fire Callahan, though, there needs to be some consistent signs of improvement. The offensive line needs to look as if they can reliably pass-block. There needs to be some semblance of a run game. Ward needs to look as if he is improving. The game management can't be a major drag on operations.
Since hiring Callahan, the Titans have changed the quarterback, the running back, their top two wide receivers and four of the five starters along the offensive line. They're the worst offense in the NFL. If Callahan is part of the solution moving forward, that has to change.
Chuba Hubbard, RB, Carolina Panthers
Week 6: Did not play in a 30-27 win over the Cowboys.
I'm finishing up by including a player who is on this list by no fault of his own. Everyone else on the hot seat had a rough Week 6. Hubbard didn't even play, as he sat out his second consecutive game with a calf injury. Hubbard was averaging 4.1 yards per carry before the injury and had a pair of touchdowns in the passing game earlier this season. Hubbard's four-year, $33 million extension in November 2024 -- along with the ACL injury suffered by Jonathon Brooks -- suggested he would be the starter in Carolina for the 2025 campaign.
Instead, that's now up in the air, and it has nothing to do with Hubbard. Rico Dowdle has simply taken over this backfield. One week after running for 206 yards in a win over the Dolphins, Dowdle went back to work in a self-described revenge game against his former employer, the Cowboys. Dowdle ran 30 times for 183 yards and added a team-high 56 receiving yards.
Dowdle became the first player since Dalvin Cook in 2020 to rack up 200 yards from scrimmage in consecutive games, a feat that has happened only 31 times in NFL history. And while the massive game against the Dolphins was fueled by a handful of huge gains, Dowdle's longest run on Sunday went for 15 yards. He simply gashed the Cowboys for meaningful yardage drive after drive, with 20 of Dowdle's 30 rush attempts being deemed successful by the NFL Next Gen Stats model. Over the past five years, just three other backs have posted a higher success rate in a game where they carried the ball at least 25 times.
What's even more impressive is that Dowdle is doing this without the sort of help other great runners have around the league. The Panthers are down to bare bones up front. The entire right side of their line was missing Sunday. Center Austin Corbett and right guard Robert Hunt are on injured reserve, while right tackle Taylor Moton was inactive with an elbow injury. The Cowboys aren't a great defense by any stretch of the imagination, but they were 18th in the league in EPA per play against designed runs before Sunday.
The Panthers did a great job of creating running lanes for Dowdle, but he also did a great job of making decisive cuts and getting the most out of what was blocked. He also added three first downs as a receiver, including a 36-yard touchdown on a blown coverage from Dallas' oft-frustrating linebackers. Dowdle ran by struggling Cowboys linebacker Kenneth Murray Jr. for a 13-yard catch and a first down earlier in the game. He is not Christian McCaffrey or Alvin Kamara, but Dowdle has made a meaningful impact in the receiving game over the past two weeks.
While Hubbard is expected to return from his injury shortly, I'm not sure how the Panthers can go back to the prior status quo, when Hubbard was the lead back and Dowdle the backup. Dowdle was already getting about 10 carries per game before his sudden star turn, but he has earned the lion's share of the work at running back now, even if that's through no fault of Hubbard's own.