The Morning According to Us

Hiring a first time coach is always a risk.

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He's better than Mangini? Who knows?

Of the eight division winners in the NFL this season, only one utilized a first-year head coach. That was Miami under Tony Sparano, who technically tied for the division, but won a tie-breaker over New England. Sparano is a first-year guy, but he's also there under the careful watch of Bill Parcells, who knows about fixing a franchise or two. The bottom line is this: you'll rarely see incredible success under a first-year head coach in the NFL.

You just wonder why so many franchises routinely embrace that route.

Over the weekend, the Jets waited barely an hour after Rex Ryan's Ravens defense had given up 23 points in a loss to Pittsburgh to offer him the head job.

"We got the right man for the job," said Jets owner Woody Johnson when Ryan accepted. Johnson has said this before. He's owned the team since 2000, and Ryan will be the fourth coach he's dealt with, including Al Groh, Herm Edwards and Eric Mangini.

Mangini is now the coach of the Browns, the team perhaps psychologically trying to purge the demons of firing Bill Belichick after he'd endured his NFL coaching growing pains in Cleveland but before he became the mad genius he is today. So they hire a Belichick student who was also fired too quickly following a pair of 9-7 season—and one bad one—in New York with what is by all means an average team with little stability at quarterback. They've hired a Belichick assistant before. So have others. None has been as good as their former boss.

There will always be guys who have some quick success, but that's also because the NFL is built up of players first. But coaches learn too. Some take years to figure out how to, say, best manage the end of a game. The problem for an owner such as Johnson is the notion that he has any real idea whether a new coach is a better coach, or just an end to old frustrations and the creation of new ones. It's almost a certainty that Mangini will improve in some respects as a coach. But he won't do so for the Jets. Johnson may have the ultimate view and know what he's doing, or he may be as disconnected with the field as he is when he takes a helicopter to home games.

The Steelers will head to the Super Bowl as one of the best franchises in pro sports, led by their third coach in nearly four decades. They'll face an old Steelers assistant. The Steelers tend to let their coaches grow up. And better.

Elsewhere…

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A Burmese fishing boat sinks, and two men aboard survive for 25 days at sea in a giant ice box.

Irish bookie places odds on Obama speech sound bites. Prop bets. Always fun.

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