The Observer, December 2, 2005
Volume XXXVIII, Issue 12
NFL Guru: Firing Mariucci will not solve Lions' problems
It's the middle of another exciting football season, which means it's time for coaches on mediocre teams to start getting the boot. The first casualty this season was Detroit Lions head coach Steve Mariucci, who was given his walking papers last Monday. While I did not expect him to get fired first (I had my money on Houston Texans coach Dom Capers or Baltimore Ravens skipper Brian Billick getting let go before Mariucci), seeing Lions defensive coordinator Dick Jauron take over for Mariucci with games left on the schedule was not totally unexpected.
Mariucci's Lions were a combined 15-28 during his tenure, not once looking like real playoff contenders. Fourth-year quarter-back Joey Harrington has failed to blossom into a star player, with his career QB rating at a dismal 67.1. The Lions spent their last three first round picks on wide receivers, who have either performed erratically or not at all (see Charles Rogers's drug and injury history). But the personnel decisions have not been made by Mariucci, but by team president Matt Millen.
Millen, a former NFL player, had no experience in any capacity close to the job he was given by the owners of the Lions. It was a big game to bring in someone as inexperienced in football management as Millen for the role of team president, but when your team is as bad as Detroit (one playoff win in the last 47 seasons), the status quo can be shaken up a little. Unfortunately, Millen has done nothing to make the Lions competitive; if anything, he's made them worse. The Lions are 20-55 since his hiring in 2001, worst in the league over that period. Millen has made some questionable personnel decisions, including the aforementioned drafting of three consecutive first round wide receivers.
This is not to say Mariucci is not to blame at all for the failures of the Lions. This was his third year with Detroit, historically the deciding year for a coach's future with the team. The first two years are given as rebuilding years, but in the parity-driven NFL, three years is the longest most teams (and fans) will wait for success. Mariucci himself knew this, saying "I think we need to [make the playoffs]. We want to, and we're going to make it happen" before the start of this season. But an inconsistent offense and injuries quickly ended hopes for a playoff run.
The Lions were never Mariucci's team, with Millen crafting the roster himself. Unlike when he began coaching the San Francisco 49ers, who hadn't had a losing record in the previous 14 seasons, the Lions needed to be rebuilt from the ground up. Even if Mariucci had control over personnel decisions, turning Detroit into a playoff contender would have been a difficult task. But the Lions have failed to show any significant improvement, and with all the underperforming first round draft picks, the team isn't any better off than it was before.
So Mariucci bows out early, and now has some time to sit back and wonder how it all went wrong. He will be hired again, perhaps by a team that will give him more control over the players he gets. But Detroit has a problem on their hands. Do they stick with Jauron, who was mostly unspectacular in his first head coaching job with the Chicago Bears? Or do they look for someone new, even though most likely none of the coaches on the market will be better than Mariucci? Either way, one thing the Lions' brass needs to be doing is taking a long hard look at Millen. He was just given a five-year extension, but if a third coach can't turn this sorry franchise around, the owners of the Lions would be wise to scrap that contract. The team could use a rebuilding both on the field and in the front office, and a fresh start with new personnel may be what ultimately saves the Lions. But blaming all the team's woes on Mariucci isn't the answer.
