he was a good enough coordinator that he was given a chance at not one but two head coaching jobs. He has two super bowl rings. He has received a check from the NFL off and on from 1972 IIRC. If you actually believe he doesnt know how to run an offense then god bless. Why dont you write a list of people who have been given the opportunity to be head coaches twice, have two super bowl rings and been in a third
Speaking of ball control. It doesn't sound like Henning's philosophy is the greatest to instill on a group of extremely young players to effectively run. It's like polar opposites IMO. Sure, let's get ourselves a young, inexperienced offense and ask it to execute a philosophy that relies mostly on precision, timing, and consistency, etc. Does anyone else not see the ignorance in that? I blame part of this on Henning. I also blame part of this on Tuna b/c he knew that we were in a massive rebuild and pushing for a major youth movement..... and, as such, he should've possessed the foresight that Henning's philosophy might present some problems.
I'm in the WAY minority here, but I really believe the problem lies more with poor QB play and offensive execution than anything else. Chad Henne hasn't made the plays, nor has he received any help from the "playmakers".
It's kind of unfair to ask for another OC that has won 2 or been in 3 Super Bowls. Especially when the team's Henning coached for relied so much on defense and it's already been proven that his offense's have been below average for nearly his entire career.
once again look at what he's had to work with. just like here. he's got an offensive line that cant run block and a new QB who is still unsure about what he sees when the ball is snapped. if you really want to understand his numbers, you have to take it a step further and look at each team and the story of each team. for example, the last year he was in carolina he lost Offensive Tackle Travelle Wharton and Center Justin Hartwig in week 1 and then had to start QB chris weinke for three games down the stretch. they still ended up 8-8 and three of their losses were by 3 points and one was by 4
Please...You are really throwing out his head coaching jobs as reason to keep him? Alright, I'll play along. Let's look at his record as HC: 1983 Atlanta: 7-9 1984 Atlanta: 4-12 1985 Atlanta: 4-12 1986 Atlanta: 7-8-1 1989 San Diego 6-10 1990 San Diego 6-10 1991 San Diego 4-12 Two HC jobs, given 4 years and 3 years to build winning franchise. Not ONE winning season. Has an overall winning percentage of .342 and his teams scored 2,068 points while giving up 2,416. As for the two Super Bowl rings I will give credit to Joe Gibbs. In 1981, the Redskins averaged 21.7 ppg and in 1982 the Redskins averaged 21.1 ppg (the offense actually got worse the year they won the Super Bowl) and had the 12th ranked offense, but "1st" ranked defense. Then the next year when Henning left the Redskins offense set a then record by scoring 541 points for a whopping 33.8 ppg. So when Henning left the following year the Redskins increased their ppg by "12.7 ppg"...WOW! And yes they had the same core players (Theismann QB, Riggins RB, Brown WR). His second stint in Washington he took over a team that was 9th in ppg with 23 in 1986. His first year, 1987, they improved to 25.3 ppg. His second year they dropped to 21.6 ppg. The next year when he was gone the team improved to 24.1 ppg. So the second time he left the team improved 2.5 ppg the following year. So exactly WHY is it you seem to really like an OC that has a HORRID record as both a HC and OC? Baffling...
you missed the point. henning sucked as head coach. the point was how many people get a second shot at head coach after failing the first time? that speaks directly to how he is viewed by people in the NFL and how good a coordinator he is or was in the 80s or 90s. if he was viewed as a crappy coordinator as you feel he is he never would have gotten a second shot. hell he would have never gotten a first shot. so you can give all the credit to gibbs but people in the nfl viewed it differently, not taking anything away from Gibbs who was a genius i mean if you're going to base your analysis off of stats then clearly Henning has become a genius in the 2000s since the panthers offense scored 2001 - 15.81 (the year before he arrived) 2002 -16.12 (his first year) 2003 -20.31 2004- 22.18 2005 -24.43 2006- 16.87 2007 -16.68 (first year new off coor took over) 2008 -25.87 2009-19.6 2010 -12.6 and in miami 2007 - 16.68 (year before he arrived) 2008 -21.56 2009 -22.5 2010 -17.3 in both cases he improved over the previous regime and carolina (other than one outlier year has steadily disintegrated since he left). now there are far more reasons for all the numbers but since you believe statistics are the end all, clearly henning is a genius in the 2000s
I am seeing a bit of a pattern there. It seems that Henning can jump start an offense in his first few years but, as opponents figure him out, his production goes back to about the same as when he first arrived. That's what I am getting from those stats. I am not saying it's true since, that's a small sample from his entire career. Not to mention, the stats don't tell the whole story. Do we have more sample tenures that we can post along with these, then perhaps we can look at the personnel of each of those tenures and get a better picture?
his last year in carolina, his offensive line was destroyed by injuries, just like the latter part of 2009 here and in 2010 his offensive line was gutted. The stats are meaningless. Teams arent figuring him out. Its the randomness of personnel year to year. When he has talent his offense is effective, when he doesnt his offense flounders. Just like every other coordinator in the league. If you want a Henning offense to succeed you must give him a run blocking line and an effective Running back. Give him that you can put just about any QB behind there. Take those away and unless you give him Peyton Manning you wont have an effective offense. And that is true for 99% of the other coordinators in the league. If you dont give a coordinator the personnel that you can either pass or run with you will not score
I am not disagreeing with that at all. I was more or less interested in getting all the tenures out there and then dissecting each one to get the information all in one place so that everyone has a point of reference here on this site to fall back on for discussion. I decided to just look at his career on wikipedia and I didn't realize he was our OC in 1979 and 1980. Granted I was 7 and 8 years old at the time. EDIT: He was not our OC... Sorry about that. Miami Dolphins 1978 - 23.25 PPG (Before Henning) (1st 16 game season) 1979 - 21.19 PPG 1980 - 16.63 PPG 1981 - 21.56 PPG (After Henning) I am referencing the number from http://www.pro-football-reference.com/teams/mia/1981.htm and looking at the scoring summary to get the numbers and dividing by the number of regular season games. Washington Redskins 1980 - 16.31 PPG (Before Henning) 1981 - 21.69 PPG 1982 - 21.11 PPG (9 game season) 1983 - 33.81 PPG (After Henning) Atlanta Falcons- Head Coach 1982 - 20.33 PPG (Before Henning) (9 game season) 1983 - 23.12 PPG 1984 - 17.56 PPG 1985 - 17.63 PPG 1986 - 17.50 PPG 1987 - 13.53 PPG (After Henning) (15 game season) Washington Redskins 1986 - 23.00 PPG (Before Henninng) 1987 - 25.27 PPG (15 game season) 1988 - 21.56 PPG 1989 - 24.00 PPG (After Henning) San Diego Chargers- Head Coach 1988 - 14.43 PPG (Before Henning) 1989 - 16.63 PPG 1990 - 19.69 PPG 1991 - 17.13 PPG 1992 - 20.94 PPG (After Henning) Detroit Lions 1991 - 21.19 PPG (Before Henning) 1992 - 17.06 PPG 1993 - 18.63 PPG 1994 - 22.19 PPG (After Henning) Buffalo Bills 1996 - 19.94 PPG (Before Henning) 1997 - 15.94 PPG 1998 - 25.00 PPG (After Henning) New York Jets 1997 - 21.75 PPG (Before Henning) 1998 - 26.00 PPG (QB Coach) 1999 - 19.13 PPG (QB Coach) 2000 - 20.06 PPG (OC) 2001 - 19.25 PPG (After Henning)
I'll simply judge the guy by the number of times he was fired (or asked to resign)..... which, come January'ish, should be 6 or 7 times. My personal opinion: his philosophy is weak, outdated, and relies on far too many variables to execute effectively. It's like he took Gibb's philosophy and replaced the "down-field, stretch the defense, keep em off balance part" with dink & dunk, ultra-conservatism.
While the stats don't always lie, they don't always tell the whole story....2003, 2005, 2008 all were trips to the postseason by his offenses....also, you can't just forget the other 20 yrs of his career where he took Washington to the playoffs and SB in multiple years and our very own Fins back in the day to the playoffs as well... the man's body of work speaks for itself.... That said, he needs to be replaced... They aren't getting the job done so either he or Sparano need to go...My guess is it'll be Henning...
Over the last 20 years, he's averaged less than 20 ppg. Just sayin. There's no reason you can't "eat up the clock" AND score points too.
That philosophy that you say was Gibbs, was Henning's philosophy...it was the other way around that Gibbs adopted his philosophy to what Henning brought to the table... Still, it's time for a change here, as I said before...
No offense, but he didn't take Wash to a SB. Gibbs did. Give credit where credit is due. I'm also not gonna toot his horn for making post season trips in Carolina just b/c he took over a talented offense that had a monster defense to back it up. His body of work says that he: comes in, gets some early production AT TIMES, and then gets fired for doing nothing there after. The stat of "going to the playoffs in 2008" also doesn't tell the whole story, so please don't go there.
If Gibbs adopted Henning's philosophy, then where are all the fast, vertical WRs on this team who can pop the top off coverage? Where is the: "if you wanna stop the run, we'll throw it over the top" mentality?.... or "If you wanna keep the safeties back, we'll ram it down your throat."? I don't see any of that style here. From what I recall, that aspect of it was Gibbs.
Maybe Gibbs "incorporated" some of Henning's philosophy, but he certainly didn't adopt his entire philosophy that we currently see.
My bad, I was going off of the list from here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Henning under the heading teams as OC. EDIT: I just realized my mistake. It says coach/administrator. I will update my post to reflect that. I also, updated the Falcons and Chargers sections to reflect that he was the Head Coach, not the OC.
dont discount the scapegoat becoming david lee. they may very well decide that the problem was henne and will blame lee and replace him with a more prominent qb coach
The most concerning thing that I read in this article was that Tony Sparano is unhappy that so many are putting the blame of the offense on his offensive coordinator. If that is the case, then Tony is a head coach that believes play calling doesn't matter and a successful play is 100% execution. If that is the case, then there is no doubt in my mind that Tony needs to be fired after this season.
no offense but gibbs immediately rehired henning as his offensive coordinator/ assistant head coach after his first failed foray into head coaching which should tell you alot about what he thought of henning. Also it's been said that Marv Levy retired becasue he didnt want to fire Henning and Bobby Beathard also had a very hard time firing Henning. Add Parcells to the mix and you have some of the brightest minds in the history of the game that respected his mind and ability
Then adjust your damn play calling to the talent you have. Don't keep calling plays like you did in 2008 when you had the ideal QB for your system and an OL that could mash folks in the running game. As a coach, you are supposed to adjust to your talent, not try to fit your talent into what you want to do. Also, there is very little in the way of actually setting plays up for success with his playcalling. For instance, exactly how does a 28 yard completion from Chad Henne to Anthony Fasano set up the Wildcat on 1st and 10. Instead of trying to get our young QB into a rythm, we jerk him out of the game after a great throw to put in a formation that hasn't worked for us in more than a year now -- a formation that is not a 1st and 10 formation at that. Why are we calling play action fakes on 3rd and long when we haven't run the ball effectively at all? Once again, this all goes back to the Parcells philosophy of the way things should be done. Parcells is a firm believer that you should keep things as simple as possible and run as few plays as possible. His thinking is that the fewer plays you run, the better you will execute those plays. It appears Tony agrees with this philosophy. You know why Bill Belichick is the best head coach in the NFL right now? He went away from Parcells's philosophy on doing things.
how do you adjust your playcalling to personnel that cant run or pass on a consistent basis. do you punt on first down? interesting you are upset by the wildcat. Who called the previous play to fasano to set up the wildcat as for belichik. all he's done is gone away from run control to pass control with his short screen passing philosophy. its still ball control but since he has an elite QB he feels its better to keep it in his hands. What do you think belichiks philosophy would be if he had chad henne? you think he's running a brady offense for henne?
To me it's more like, regardless of whether their philosophies are different (they are, a little), Gibbs is an offensive guy and a Hall of Fame Coach, is famous for his vision and ability to coach the offense, and I doubt he would have allowed coaching of the details to go by the wayside the way they have in Miami
If the talent is that bad, then Jeff Ireland should be fired. He should be fired anyone, but that's another story. Belichick didn't just change from a ball control run game to a ball control pass game. He went completely away from the philosophy that you should be able to tell the defense what you are running and still execute the play well enough to have success. Belichick puts a lot more emphasis on scheme and game planning than Parcells ever did, or Henning does for that matter. Belichick does a great job of taking away what you do well and forcing you to do what you don't do well. With Henning, we have no such thing. We do the same thing day in and day out regardless, and it is obviously because he feels that scheming and play calling has no effect on the outcome of the play. And don't try to tell me that it is because Belichick has more talent either. Yes, he has a HOF QB. He's played most of this season without his best offensive lineman though. He dumped his supposedly best receiver and has his HOF QB throwing to the likes of Deion Branch, Wes Welker, and Brandon Tate. His two most productive tight ends are rookies. Ben Jarvis-Green-Ellis-Smith-Touhy-Johnson was an UDFA who is little more than a straight ahead runner.
just to give these numbers a slight bit of context I'll throw in what QBs he had when he was coach or coordinator. I will leave out miami since we all should be familiar. now this is only one position. to get a true feel you have to analyze every offensive position and even then you are only getting a partial feel 1981–1982 - Washington Redskins - Off Coordinator 81/ Joe Thiesman 16 gms started 82/ Joe Theisman 9 gms started (strike shortened) Super Bowl win 1983–1986 - Atlanta Falcons - Head Coach 83/ Steve Bartkowski 14 gms started 83/ Mike Moroski 3 gms started 84/ Steve Bartkowski 11 gms started 84/ Mike Moroski 5 gms started 85/ David Archer 11 gms started 85/ Steve Bartkowski 5 gms started 86/ David Archer 11 gms started 86/ Turk Schonert 5 gms started 1987–1988 - Washington Redskins - Off Coordinator 87/ Jay Schroeder 11 gms started 87/ Doug Williams 2 gms started Super Bowl win 87/ Ed Rubbert 3 gms started 88/ Doug Williams 10 gms started 88/ Mark Rypien 6 gms started 1989–1991 - San Diego Chargers - Head Coach 89/ Jim McMahon 11 gms started 89/ Billy Joe Tolliver 5 gms started 90/ Billy Joe Tolliver 14 gms started 90/ John Friesz 1 gm started 90/ Mark Vlasic 1 gm started 91/ John Friesz 16 gms started 1992–1993 - Detroit Lions – Offensive Coordinator 92/ Rodney Peete 10 gms started 92/ Andre Ware 3 gms started 92/ Erik Kramer 3 gms started 93/ Rodney Peete 10 gms started 93/ Erik Kramer 4 gms started 93/ Andre Ware 2 gms started 1997 -Buffalo Bills - Offensive Coordinator 97/ Todd Collins 13 gms started 97/ Alex Van Pelt 3 gms started 2000 - New York Jets - Offensive Coordinator 00/ Vinnie Testeverde 16 gms started 2002–2006 - Carolina Panthers - Offensive Coordinator 02/ Rodney Peete 14 gms started 02/ Randy Fasani 1 gm started 02/ Chris Weinke 1 gm started 03/ Jake Delhomme 15 gms started 03/ Rodney Peete 1 gm started 04/ Jake Delhomme 16 gms started 05/ Jake Delhomme 16 gms started 06/ Jake Delhomme 13 gms started 06/ Chris Weinke 3 gms started
Yeah, I don't know if I'd hate on Henning for Buffalo. Kelly retiring and Todd Collins being the guy really jacked that place up (it's been that way since Kelly left, how similar to our own situation that is). The others are open to interpretation, but that one I wouldn't stick him for.
adamprez2003, I was just going back through this thread and I noticed something from the numbers you posted for us (Dolphins). In 2009 we were actually more productive than in 2008. That was with Henne as the starting QB for 13 games. With that, there must be more to this years slump than the QB and OC. I am not sure but, it seems this is an entire offensive unit failure. So, who is responsible, I don't know. Perhaps it's because opponents have a years worth of tape on Henne and are exploiting his weaknesses? I am not sure how much cover 2 he faced in 2009, which is why I am asking.
