By admin 
I’m not usually writing a book and I’m definitely not trying to pull a Sheldon Cooper by winning the Nobel Prize in physics. So I don’t usually mind — and actually kind of find it cool — when research reveals that a thesis of mine is completely inaccurate.
And I’ve rarely been more wrong than I was about NFL teams and how they fare in their first game under a new head coach. I thought they did well. Guess what? They do not!
How Have New NFL Head Coaches Fared In Week One?
Since the 2000 season, NFL teams are just 67-103-2 — a .396 winning percentage — in season openers under a new head coach. Appropriately enough, last year’s seven teams with new head coaches went 2-5, a .400 winning percentage.
Turns out I put too much stock into outlier local and/or high-profile results when assuming new head coaches did well in their first game at the helm.
I remember the New York Jets routing the Seattle Seahawks 41-3 in Bill Parcells’ first game in 1997, when the New York Giants also debuted under Jim Fassel with a 31-17 win over the Philadelphia Eagles.
The Giants earned another memorable first win under Brian Daboll in 2022, when Daboll successfully went for two following a last-minute touchdown in a 21-20 victory over the Tennessee Titans.
View Lindy’s Sports Live Blog Fantasy Football Week 1 Rankings
I also remembered the expansion Houston Texans, under Dom Capers, winning the first game in franchise history by stunning the Dallas Cowboys 19-10 in the 2002 opener.
As I learned in my deep dive at Pro-Football-Reference.com, these are the exceptions to the rule. I (justifiably) forgot dud debuts such as Adam Gase’s Jets blowing a double-digit fourth-quarter lead in a 17-16 loss to the Buffalo Bills in 2019, which absolutely turned out to be a sign of things to come.
I also forgot the San Francisco 49ers suffered a 23-3 loss to the Carolina Panthers in Kyle Shanahan’s first game as head coach in 2017. Things have gotten better since then (at least until the Super Bowl).
And thankfully, I have little recollection of the Cleveland Browns losing ALL NINE of their season openers under a new head coach.
Fantasy Football Week 1 Rankings:
- Fantasy Football QB Rankings: Who to Start in Week 1?
- Fantasy Football RB Rankings: Who to Start in Week 1?
- Fantasy Football TE Rankings: Who to Start in Week 1?
Good news for the Browns: They get to try again today — along with a whopping nine other clubs, including a pair of annual contenders in the unusual position of debuting under a new head coach.
Here’s our look at the chances for each debuting head coach to get a win today, starting with the two games pitting new coaches against one another. This at least means the new guys won’t post a .000 winning percentage today. They could go winless with a couple ties, though!
Atlanta Falcons (Kevin Stefanski) at Pittsburgh Steelers (Mike McCarthy)
Stefanski’s reward for escaping the Browns after six dysfunctional seasons is the possibility he will have open his Atlanta tenure with Steve DeBerg at quarterback. Remember when DeBerg made one start at age 44 for the Super Bowl-bound Falcons in 1998? That was awesome.
Anyway, Tua Tagovailoa won the Falcons’ underwhelming quarterback battle by default when Michael Penix Jr.’s recovery from knee surgery spilled into the regular season. But Tagovailoa suffered an oblique injury this week, which seemingly vaulted third-stringer Cooper Rush into the week one lineup. Except now HE has back spasms.
Not the best way to begin a season or a coaching tenure…and yet it opens up the possibility Rush or some random dude off the street will pull a Joshua Dobbs and steer the Falcons to an upset of the Steelers in what Aaron Rodgers swears is the last season opener of his career. Really. This time he means it. At some point the boy who cried wolf was eaten by a wolf and nobody cared.
Related: Aaron Rodgers Has Sharp Take On Steelers Super Bowl Chances
Most of America is at that point with Rodgers and would love to see his so-called final act begin with an embarrassing defeat.
Alas, McCarthy will probably win his first game with his hometown team — and the first game for a new Steelers head coach since way back in 2007, when Mike Tomlin debuted with a 34-7 win over the Browns. Who amazingly were not coached by a new guy on the sidelines — and went on to finish 10-6 under third-year head coach Romeo Crennel yet missed the playoffs anyway, because Browns.
Miami Dolphins (Jeff Hafley) at Las Vegas Raiders (Klint Kubiak)
What a perfect matchup — two formerly proud and successful franchises hitting the reset button once again.
Today marks the ninth time this century the Dolphins have debuted a new coach in a season opener, the third-highest figure in the NFL behind the Browns (10 times) and…that’s right, the Raiders, who are opening the season under a new coach for the 12th time since 2000. That’s one almost every other year for Oakland/Las Vegas, which will unveil Kubiak 52 weeks after Pete Carroll opened his one-and-done tenure.
Carroll at least got off to a 1-0 start when the Raiders upset the New England Patriots and fellow newcomer Mike Vrabel 20-13. And then what happened?
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The Raiders obviously aren’t very good, but Kubiak would seem to be well-positioned to enjoy a similarly productive opener against Hafley and the Dolphins, who should be really, Really, REALLY bad.
Miami has more money tied up in dead money than active players and is predicted to go winless by CBS Sports. That might be a little difficult, since the Dolphins DO play the Jets twice. And today they’re playing a Raiders team sans Brock Bowers that is just a three-point favorite at home, which amounts to a pick ‘em. You know what? I’ve talked myself into Malik Wills and the Dolphins. Go Fish.
(Do not wager based on my hunch, or at all, because this game is for the degenerates)
Ravens (Jesse Minter) at Colts
Like the Steelers, the Ravens are debuting under a new head coach today for just the second time this century. John Harbaugh opened his 18-season stint with a 17-10 win over the Cincinnati Bengals in 2008, when he steered the Ravens to the AFC Championship Game against Tomlin and the Steelers.
There are expectations for a similarly deep playoff run for Minter, the former Los Angeles Chargers offensive coordinator who coached with both Harbaugh brothers and is walking into one of the most stable situations in the NFL…at least until January, when Lamar Jackson will probably turn into a pumpkin again. But he should be 1-0 tonight after facing the Colts, who looked in the preseason like they were still hungover from last year’s disastrous finish.
Bills (Joe Brady) at Texans
Brady is the eighth new week one coach this century for the Bills — but their first since 2017, when Sean McDermott’s largely successful nine-season run began with a 21-12 win over the Jets.
McDermott’s dismissal fewer than 48 hours after the Bills’ controversial AFC Divisional round loss to the Denver Broncos in January was surprising and accompanied by plenty of criticism. But you don’t have to squint too hard to see how this might work out for the Bills like the Tom Thibodeau-for-Mike Brown trade worked out for the NBA’s New York Knicks, a similarly championship-starved franchise run by a meddlesome owner who managed to stumble into the right win-now coaching change.
To get to Super Bowl 61, the Bills might have to deal with the Texans again in January. Whether it’s the Sunday after Labor Day or two Sundays before the Super Bowl, though, we’ll always like the Bills over the Texans because Buffalo has Josh Allen and Houston most decidedly does not.
Browns (Todd Monken) at Jaguars
Good news for Monken and the Browns: All they have to do is look across the field to see a team freshly removed from snapping a lengthy losing streak in a head coach’s debut. Liam Coen became the first Jaguars head coach to win his first game at the helm in week one last season, when Jacksonville beat the Carolina Panthers 26-10.
Bad news for Monken and the Browns: They still have Deshaun Watson but not Myles Garrett.
In a world filled with never-ending examples of good things happening to bad people, we suppose Watson’s first appearance since Oct. 20, 2004 could result in a win. It’s also almost impossible to imagine the league’s worst starting quarterback and a Garrett-less defense figuring out a way to keep up with the Jaguars, who are vastly superior on both sides of the ball. At least Monken will have some company amongst Browns coaches who have lost their debut.
Giants (John Harbaugh) vs. Cowboys
Tonight’s game would be interesting even without Harbaugh, the former Super Bowl-winning coach of the Ravens, making his debut for the Giants.
Games between the longtime rivals are always personal at the owners level. The Giants’ John Mara is the son of Wellington Mara, the late patriarch who said “It’s nice to see arrogance humbled” following a win over Jerry Jones’ then-defending Super Bowl champions in 1996 (really, the Cowboys used to win titles, go ask your grandparents).
Throw Harbaugh into the mix and you can see why NBC wanted a game pitting two teams who won a combined 11 games last season in prime time.
The Giants have the reputation of NFL royalty, but their 55 victories the last 10 seasons rank ahead of only the slapstick Jets. Mara & Co. clearly believe they are a competent coach away from returning to contention, but what if Jaxson Dart and Cam Skattebo either can’t stay on the field or are more consumed by their newfound celebrity?
Tonight will offer the first hint of where this is going to go. And you can never go wrong assuming the Cowboys will find a way to make the last mistake.
Cardinals (Mike LeFleur) at Chargers
The Cardinals are one of three teams winless this century in season openers under a new head coach along with those woeful Browns as well as the Cincinnati Bengals (just 0-2 under Marvin Lewis and Zac Taylor).
But Arizona doesn’t have a .000 winning percentage in those six games thanks to a 27-27 tie with the Detroit Lions in Kliff Kingsbury’s debut in 2019. Seven years later, a tie would be almost as good as a win for these Cardinals, who allowed the fourth-most points in the league last season and get to open the LeFleur era against Jim Harbaugh and his new offensive coordinator, former Dolphins head coach Mike McDaniel.
Arizona counters with an offense led by Jacoby Brissett, who won as many games for the Cardinals (one) last season as he did fantasy titles for me. You’re my guy, Jacoby, but this is going to be a long game to start a long season.
Titans (Robert Saleh) vs. Jets
Speaking of week one ties…I’m sure there’s something I’ve wanted more than for this game to end in a tie. I just can’t think of it right now.
The Jets current embattled coach going against his predecessor? There’s an almost limitless amount of ways things can go hilariously wrong this afternoon.
Saleh spent most of his time as Jets coach trying to win games with Zach Wilson as his quarterback, but the Titans are a dysfunctional mess at the ownership level — at least Saleh will be used to that — and he didn’t do much else in New Jersey to indicate he’ll become just the third ex-Jets coach to win a playoff game somewhere else.
Glenn, a one-time star cornerback for the Jets, oversaw a defense last season that somehow did not record an interception before he fired most of his coaching staff. All of which means the only thing funnier than the Jets winning on a walk-off pick six will be a tie. Please please please let it happen.
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This story was originally published September 13, 2026 at 8:03 AM.