Nearly half of the National Football League's 32 head coaches have turned over in the last two years. The aftermath of the 2012 and 2013 seasons have seen 15 coaching changes at 14 different clubs (the Cleveland Browns double-dipped).
It's hard to get a job in this cutthroat league. Once you do get a job, it's hard to keep it. And, as we'll see, if you happen to lose that job, it's hard to jump back in. After taking a look at the hiring cycles in FBS and FCS, we close up shop on the year-in-review series with the NFL.
Of the seven incoming coaches...
FIVE served as NFL coordinators (Jim Caldwell, Jay Gruden, Mike Pettine, Ken Whisenhunt and Mike Zimmer)
ONE was temporarily out of coaching (Lovie Smith)
ONE was plucked from the college ranks (Bill O'Brien)
Breaking things down a little further...
THREE became NFL head coaches for a second time (Caldwell, Smith and Whisenhunt), and
FOUR are stepping into their first NFL head coaching gigs (Gruden, O'Brien, Pettine and Zimmer)
Now where is where things get ugly.
Of the seven outgoing coaches...
ONE has found work as an NFL coordinator (Leslie Frazier)
ONE is back in the league as a position coach (Mike Munchak), and
FIVE are (at the moment) out of coaching (Rob Chudzinski, Gary Kubiak, Greg Schiano, Jim Schwartz and Mike Shanahan)
That number is likely to go down as the soil shifts in the NFL coaching landscape over the next few weeks but, yeah, the NFL can be a brutal win-or-go-home business.