With six weeks in the books, the NFL is now a third of the way through the 2026 NFL season. That means now is a fair time to check in on the 10 new head coaches hired this offseason. Ten is tied for the most head-coaching changes in a single offseason ever, and six of the hires are first-time NFL head coaches.
The head-coaching veterans in new places are Mike McCarthy, Kevin Stefanski, John Harbaugh and Robert Saleh. Here is a look at the 10 we will be grading and ranking through Week 6, listed in alphabetical order by team: Let's dig into the 2026 new head coaches' report cards. It's hard not to feel bad for rookie NFL head coach Jeff Hafley in his first season in charge.
He's doing the best he can for a franchise that is paying more for players not on its roster (an NFL-record $179 million in dead cap hits) than for the players on its roster ($156 million) in 2026. As a result, the Dolphins are just the fifth team since at least 1950 to not lead in any of their first five games of a season, per CBS Sports Research. They joined Washington (1954, 1965), the Minnesota Vikings (1962) and the Houston Texans (2005) as the only teams to pull off this sad feat.
Miami has the worst scoring offense (14.0 points per game) by mere decimal points. They entered 2026 with the least experienced roster (608 career starts) by any team to open a season in recorded history since such data tracking began at the start of the 21st century, per CBS Sports Research. They also had one career Pro Bowl selection on their roster entering Week 1, running back De'Von Achane in 2025, which is tied for the fewest by any team to open a season in recorded history (2000).
Oh, and Achane went down with a torn ACL in Week 3. That really makes it almost impossible to evaluate Hafley's acumen as an NFL head coach. He's playing with an arm tied behind his back on a weekly basis in Year 1 of the Dolphins' latest rebuild.
It's been a rough start to the Robert Saleh era in Tennessee. Offensive coordinator Brian Daboll's group has the NFL's second-worst scoring offense (14.0 points per game), mere decimal points ahead of the Miami Dolphins, and the league's worst total offense (236.3 total yards per game). Quarterback Cam Ward, the 2025 first overall pick, has the worst expected points added (EPA) per dropback (-0.15) since he entered the league last season.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
