Atlanta is going with Kevin Stefanski as its next head coach. On the one hand, he went only 8-26 in his final two seasons with the Browns. But at the same time, he’s won the league’s Coach of the Year award twice.
Stefanski was the Coach of the Year after helping the Browns to a 11-5 record in 2020, highlighted by their first playoff win since the franchise relaunched in 1999 – at Heinz Field, no less. And he went COY again in 2023, with the Browns going 11-6 before losing a hard-fought battle at Arrowhead against Kansas City.
It's unraveled the last two years, but Stefanski has shown he can oversee a successful operation.
In Atlanta, Stefanski will work with a new GM (Ian Cunningham), and he’s brought Tommy Rees with him to call plays. The Falcons picked Michael Penix with the eighth pick of the 2024 draft, but he hasn’t emerged yet and is rehabbing a torn ACL.
It’s not often a coach who’s won the Coach of the Year award twice lands with a new team, and those who do usually are at the tail end of their careers. Stefanski, on the other hand, is only 43.
In the past 40 years, six other coaches who’ve won the Coach of the Year award multiple times have been hired into new jobs, and they haven’t tended to be successful. In 24 combined seasons, they went 180-207-1, with eight playoff berths and one Super Bowl appearance (Bruce Arians won with Tampa Bay).
Of those previous coaches, they finished with winning records in only 9 of 24 seasons (with two teams going an even 8-8). Only five of those 24 won double-digit games.
| MULTIPLE COACH OF THE YEAR AWARDS | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coach | Year | Team | W | L | T | Pct. | Post |
| Chuck Knox | 1992 | LAR | 6 | 10 | 0 | .375 | -- |
| Chuck Knox | 1993 | LAR | 5 | 11 | 0 | .313 | -- |
| Chuck Knox | 1994 | LAR | 4 | 12 | 0 | .250 | -- |
| Bill Parcells | 1997 | NYJ | 9 | 7 | 0 | .563 | -- |
| Bill Parcells | 1998 | •NYJ | 12 | 4 | 0 | .750 | 1-1 |
| Bill Parcells | 1999 | NYJ | 8 | 8 | 0 | .500 | -- |
| Bill Parcells | 2003 | •Dall. | 10 | 6 | 0 | .625 | 0-1 |
| Bill Parcells | 2004 | Dall. | 6 | 10 | 0 | .375 | -- |
| Bill Parcells | 2005 | Dall. | 9 | 7 | 0 | .563 | -- |
| Bill Parcells | 2006 | •Dall. | 9 | 7 | 0 | .563 | 0-1 |
| Mike Ditka | 1997 | N.O. | 6 | 10 | 0 | .375 | -- |
| Mike Ditka | 1998 | N.O. | 6 | 10 | 0 | .375 | -- |
| Mike Ditka | 1999 | N.O. | 3 | 13 | 0 | .188 | -- |
| Joe Gibbs | 2004 | Was. | 6 | 10 | 0 | .375 | -- |
| Joe Gibbs | 2005 | •Was. | 10 | 6 | 0 | .625 | 1-1 |
| Joe Gibbs | 2006 | Was. | 5 | 11 | 0 | .313 | -- |
| Joe Gibbs | 2007 | •Was. | 9 | 7 | 0 | .563 | 0-1 |
| Bruce Arians | 2019 | T.B. | 7 | 9 | 0 | .438 | -- |
| Bruce Arians | 2020 | ••T.B. | 11 | 5 | 0 | .688 | 4-0 |
| Bruce Arians | 2021 | •T.B. | 13 | 4 | 0 | .765 | 1-1 |
| Ron Rivera | 2020 | •Was. | 7 | 9 | 0 | .438 | 0-1 |
| Ron Rivera | 2021 | Was. | 7 | 10 | 0 | .412 | -- |
| Ron Rivera | 2022 | Was. | 8 | 8 | 1 | .500 | -- |
| Ron Rivera | 2023 | Was. | 4 | 13 | 0 | .235 | -- |
| Kevin Stefanski | 2026 | Atl. | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
If we’ve going back further, Don Shula was phenomenally successful with the Dolphins, winning back-to-back Super Bowls in the ‘70s. And Chuck Knox took the Seahawks to the playoffs four times in the ‘80s.
—Ian Allan
