All four NFL conference championship coaches deserve credit for getting their team to this point. Kyle Shanahan turned around the Niners after finally getting his franchise quarterback in place and a defense built to carry the team. Andy Reid has been a staple in the playoffs for most of his career. Matt LaFleur and Mike Vrabel are young, up-and-coming coaches who led their teams to heights few predicted in 2019. So let’s do the obvious thing and rank them.
Kyle Shanahan
There are two options for the top spot, but Shanahan deserves the honor. He has always been regarded as one of the best offensive minds in the game. He’s led offenses in Houston, Washington, Cleveland and Atlanta — and his Atlanta offense was historically great. Shanahan’s goal of a positionless scheme with interchangeable players pressures every portion of opposing defenses. He manages games extremely well and he knows when to trust Jimmy Garoppolo and when to lean on the Niners running game.
Shanahan has one big playoff gaffe to his name, but he stays true to his gameplan, and that’s why he didn’t take his foot off the gas against the Patriots in Super Bowl LI. At least he’s consistent.
Shanahan is going to be with the Niners for a very long time. In his first season with a healthy team and a franchise quarterback set, he’s lead his team to the NFC Championship round. His team is favored to make it to the Super Bowl. In a few short years, he transformed a bottom of the barrel NFC West team to a Super Bowl contender.
Andy Reid
Andy Reid is one of the greatest regular-season coaches of all time. That much is not debatable. He’s 207-128-1 over 21 years. He’s almost unbeatable after bye weeks. He’s forgotten more football than most people have ever watched. He’s had two dominant runs — one with Eagles and now with the Chiefs. His coaching tree has spread throughout the league and he’s changed his offense to the skillset of his all-world quarterback.
But — and you all know the but — Reid is 13-14 in the playoffs. He needed a bunch of chances to get over the hump of the NFC Championship game in Philadelphia. He’s 3-5 in Kansas City. His clock management gaffes are legendary. That has to be taken into account when ranking coaches remaining in this playoffs.
Reid is still better than almost any other option. His work coming back from a 24-point deficit in the AFC divisional round was impressive — with the help of Mahomes of course. Reid was an overtime away from the Super Bowl this year. He should make it this year.
Mike Vrabel
If you haven’t read Doug Farrar’s breakdown of Mike Vrabel’s coaching brilliance in the playoffs, it’s time to take a look at it.
Vrabel made the bold decision to go away from Marcus Mariota — who was crowned the franchise quarterback only a few years ago. All Tennessee has done since was go on a regular-season run to make the playoffs, knock off the Patriots in New England and topple the No. 1 seed Ravens in Baltimore. That takes some coaching talent.
The Titans have changed up their defense and confused and stopped the greatest quarterback of all time and the 2020 presumptive MVP. Vrabel has leaned on Derrick Henry and Henry’s rewarded his coach with two playoff games with over 180 yards rushing in each. At this point, Vrabel has earned his team’s respect and he should be getting the same from outside of Tennessee.
Matt LaFleur
Matt LaFleur being listed fourth is not a shot at the first-year head coach. Green Bay looks great when it comes out with scripted plays. LaFleur has brought balance to an offense often dominated by Aaron Rodgers going off-script. Aaron Jones is now a weapon that lessens the Packers’ reliance on their all-world quarterback. Sometimes that’s a good thing.
It’s just that the Packers often let teams hang around. They sometimes struggle on offense after their scripted plays are done. They finished at 13-3 but they don’t feel like a team that really went 13-3. The Packers won their first playoff game against the Seahawks but Seattle was a shell of a team. It would be tough to put LaFleur over the other three coaches on this list.
