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What is it about turning around 2 different NFL franchises, leading them both to a Conference Championship and having a .558 winning percentage that isn't good enough to even be be considered a top 15 head coach?
John Fox took over a Carolina team in 2002 that had just went 1-15, with their last winning record coming in 1996. His first year there he improved the Panthers win total to 7 games, and in year two he had them at 11 wins with an NFC Championship. In his 9 years in Carolina his teams had a losing record 4 times, going 73-71 in the regular season. Not bad, not necessarily good, but his Panther teams were 5-3 in the playoffs.
After Fox was done in Carolina after the 2010 season, he was immediately hired to take over a Denver team that just went 4-12 and hadn't had a winning season since 2005. Fox didn't help Denver to a wining record in his first year, but his 8-8 Broncos snuck into the playoffs after a 1-4 start. Year two of the Fox regime saw Peyton Manning come to town and the next year Fox had his 2nd team in the Super Bowl. He was 46-18 with the Broncos before he was fired after the 2014 season.
Which led to Fox taking over a Chicago Bears team in desperate need of some professionalism after suffering through a dysfunctional 5-11 2014. Fox only helped the Bears improve by one win in the standings, but the tone he set and the accountability he demanded from his players payed dividends to a franchise in need of direction.
Maybe Fox isn't the Xs&Os savant like some of his peers, but he's exactly what the Bears needed. I think he's a good coach, but Rotoworld's Patrick Daugherty ranks him 16th overall, and he came out firing.
Have you ever been sitting in traffic and noticed the signs on a telephone pole or stop sign? There's usually one about a lost cat or someone offering guitar lessons. Maybe Spanish tutoring. Then there's the house flippers, bootstrappers looking for rundown properties to buy on the cheap, gut, refurbish and sell for a profit. That's John Fox. He comes into town in such a hurry that he barely even has time to communicate any clichés to the media. He tears out the rotted deck, puts down sod, replaces the smoke-ruined curtains. Maybe he even orders new carpet and countertops. What he doesn't do is leave behind a finished product. There's always the next house to flip. Fox makes his teams respectable in a hurry. The Bears went from embarrassing eyesore to inoffensive "Previous" option on the remote under his watch in 2015. What they didn't do is look like a team ready to win the division any time soon. Fox might progress the Bears another level or two before GM Ryan Pace reaches the same conclusion John Elway did in Denver. This guy made the place livable, but it could still be so much nicer.
Huh?
Did he see the crap that Marc Trestman and Phil Emery left he and Ryan Pace to work with?
What do you guys think of the rating?
Take a look at some of the coaches he ranks higher than Fox.