Grading the NFL's 2024 coaching hires, from Jerod Mayo to Jim Harbaugh

Hiring a head coach may be the most important piece of building a Super Bowl winner. They’re the ones in charge of designing plays, developing prospects and squeezing every minute advantage they can find in a league ruled by parity and a game decided by inches.

That’s what one quarter of the NFL has had to do in 2024 after a brutal year for forgettable and legendary coaches alike. Brandon Staley and Josh McDaniels failed to make it out of the regular season, because of course they did. But they were joined among the Wikipedia list of “former NFL coaches” by coach of the year winners Ron Rivera, Pete Carroll and Bill Belichick.

That’s meant plenty of off-field headlines in the midst of the 2024 NFL Playoffs. This is where we attempt to grade each hire, starting with Belichick’s replacement in Foxborough until every last position is filled before free agency takes shape.

Here’s the thing. Predicting the impact of an NFL head coach is a notoriously slippery tightrope to walk. Some guys who look like rising stars spin off track and explode into a million pieces. Others who appear questionable can get you to the Super Bowl (hello, Zac Taylor). And sometimes a team hires Lovie Smith and tells you exactly what’s going to happen next.

There aren’t any Lovies in the 2024 NFL head coach hiring cycle, which is my fun way of telling you these grades could be comically and horrifically incorrect. I am, after all, part of a group effort at SB Nation that once gave the Detroit Lions a glowing review for hiring Matt Patricia.

This is all to say Jerod Mayo could wind up hoisting the Vince Lombardi Trophy after Super Bowl 60 or Jim Harbaugh could nope his way out of Los Angeles after 13 games and 17 injured starters. These are snap judgments based on what we know, not what comes next. And with free agency and the 2024 NFL Draft looming, there’s a lot that could change very quickly.

Let’s figure out who’s in the best spot.