Mike Vrabel would be great coaching fit for Jets or Giants; just ask his former player
Tennessee Titans head coach Mike Vrabel argues a call during the first half of an NFL football game against the Jacksonville Jaguars Sunday, Jan. 7, 2024, in Nashville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV) Credit: AP/George Walker IV
Looking for a head coach this offseason, as the Jets will be and the Giants could be?
Logan Ryan has just the guy for you.
“Mike Vrabel is definitely one of the best 32 head coaches in the world,” the former NFL safety told Newsday this past week. “He definitely deserves a job and deserves to be a top candidate in this hiring cycle.”
That’s hardly an outlandish take. Vrabel is at the top of most lists. The more surprising aspect to it is that Vrabel is available to begin with. He was fired by the Titans last January after six seasons in which Tennessee went 54-45, won two division titles and made it to the AFC Championship Game in the 2019 season. In 2021 he was the NFL Coach of the Year. And yet there were no teams that hired him for their vacancies last offseason. He spent 2024 as a coaching and personnel consultant for the Browns.
In a world in which franchises so often hire unproven commodities to come in and run their teams, Vrabel is a proven winner with experience and pedigree. Now that the University of North Carolina has filled its vacancy with Bill Belichick, he almost certainly will be the trophy of next month’s interviewing frenzy.
Eight head coaches were hired last offseason. Two of the three who have winning records had been head coaches in the league before: Jim Harbaugh and Dan Quinn. Seattle’s Mike Macdonald is the only rookie above .500.
What makes Ryan’s perspective on Vrabel different from those of most is that he played for him. Ryan, now an NFL analyst for CBS Sports HQ, was a Titan from 2017-19 and a key part of Vrabel’s most successful seasons in Tennessee. Those three seasons told Ryan all he needed to know about Vrabel.
“I think a coach needs to be a great leader of men, and he is that,” Ryan said. “He has a really high football IQ. He’s played the game, and I think a lot of players respect that. He studies ball and knows ball. Strategy-wise, you see a lot of teams mess up late-game strategies. Vrabel never did that. We were so good at that in Tennessee.
“I know everybody wants to go offensive guru, but when you need someone to lead an organization and get everyone in line and get everyone on the same page to give you the best chance to win, he’s a coach who can and will do that.”
Sounds exactly like what the Jets need. What every team needs.
Would Vrabel fit into the New York sportscape? Ryan, who did that about as well as any player in any sport in recent memory when he was with the Giants, said he undoubtedly would.
Would Vrabel want to fit into New York? That’s a different question.
“I think it depends on where Vrabel wants to go,” Ryan said. “He gets to pick his situation. But he is definitely someone who can handle the media and someone who can get the best out of his team.”
Vrabel had his best years as a player in New England under Belichick, and he certainly learned plenty during those seasons, but he definitely is not a typical disciple of that coaching tree, which has produced more dead limbs than most.
“Belichick earns his credibility from his resume, from the winning,” said Ryan, who also played under Belichick in New England from 2013-16. “Belichick is one of the greatest teachers of football, period. If you want to learn from the best professors in business or literature, you go to Harvard. Belichick is the greatest professor of football.”
Ryan added: “Vrabel comes from more of a players’ perspective of having played it. He can go out there and put his hands on an offensive lineman and show him how to actually do a move. He played under Belichick and he had the studies, but he definitely relates as a leader, as a guy who has been on the battlefield with you. Belichick hasn’t been on the field with you, he just has years of knowledge.”
The most significant quality that Vrabel possesses? According to Ryan it’s that he is, well, authentically Vrabel.
“Players nowadays can see through coaches if they are not being themselves,” he said. “Vrabel is himself. His personality as a player is the same way he coaches — he’s loud, he’s confident, he’s an alpha. That’s who he was as a player and no one should be surprised that’s who he is as a coach. He’s himself through and through, and that’s really important for a coach.”
Sign us up!
A look at some other head coaching candidates besides Vrabel who should and potentially could interest both the Jets and Giants:
BEN JOHNSON, 38
Lions offensive coordinator
The staggering numbers posted by Detroit this season — 32.8 points and 403.9 yards per game — only add to a resume that was compelling enough last year to get him interviews for seven head coach openings. He decided to return to the Lions for at least one more year and might do that again if he can’t find a situation he can make work right away. That means an established quarterback and neither the Giants nor Jets are in clear possession of one of those for 2025. It’s an obstacle but maybe a high draft pick, free agency plan of attack, or the return of a certain Hall of Famer could be enticing.
BRIAN FLORES, 43
Vikings defensive coordinator
The Giants certainly had interest in the Brownsville, Brooklyn product three years ago when they wound up hiring Brian Daboll — even though a still-active discrimination lawsuit filed by Flores against the Giants and the league suggests his interviews in New York were a sham. There’s probably no way the two sides could reconcile and join forces with that litigation still between them. But the Jets? They might be interested in hiring the right Brian at a time when it is looking more and more like the Giants did not. And like Vrabel, he comes with head coaching experience having led the Dolphins for three years (albeit with a 24-25 record).
AARON GLENN, 52
Lions defensive coordinator
These next few weeks will be a good audition for Glenn to see how he handles adversity with about half of Detroit’s defensive starters on the shelf with injuries. But he navigated the team through the massive loss of Aidan Hutchinson early in the season so he gets points for that. A former NFL cornerback who was a Jets first-round pick in 1994 and played here until 2001, a homecoming might be an intriguing aspect to the job for both sides.
LIAM COEN, 39
Buccaneers offensive coordinator
The latest in the line of prodigies from the Sean McVay School of Coaching, Coen spent three years as a position assistant with the Rams (2018-20) and returned to be the offensive coordinator in 2022 (he replaced current Vikings coach Kevin O’Connell). After a year at Kentucky, he returned to the NFL with the Bucs and has helped Baker Mayfield steady his career. Need a letter of recommendation on him? Maybe the Giants can ask his old college roommate when he was a quarterback at UMass: Victor Cruz.
JOE BRADY, 35
Bills offensive coordinator
His best stints as a play-caller were when he was running the offense at LSU in 2019 and his time with the Bills since he replaced Ken Dorsey last season. Of course his quarterbacks at both of those places were Joe Burrow and Josh Allen. They won a Heisman and could win an MVP under his coaching, but after seeing what Daboll brought to the Giants after his prolific tenure with Allen in Buffalo, the current Giants coach could be more of a cautionary tale than a career path. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the better the quarterback is, the better the coach looks and not the other way around. Still, the Bills’ numbers and success this season without many big-name stars besides Allen will likely make Brady a hot name in January.
— Tom Rock
Tom Rock began covering sports for Newsday in 1996 and became its NFL columnist in 2022. He previously was Newsday's Giants beat writer beginning in 2008.