Brian Callahan and Will Levis aren't in great company through three games .
The new-look Tennessee Titans are 0-3 to begin the Callahan era following Sunday's 30-14 loss vs. the Green Bay Packers . Out of 49 tandems of first-year coach and quarterback age-25 or younger to start the first three games of a season since 2000, Levis and Callahan are only the seventh duo to begin with three straight losses.
The other pairs don't inspire much confidence:
- Dennis Green and Josh McCown (2004 Cardinals)
- Eric Mangini and Brady Quinn (2009 Browns)
- Joe Judge and Daniel Jones (2020 Giants)
- Urban Meyer and Trevor Lawrence (2021 Jaguars)
- Robert Saleh and Zach Wilson (2021 Jets)
- Frank Reich and Bryce Young (2023 Panthers)
ESTES | The Titans failed Malik Willis, and now they're failing Levis
The six coaches above combined to post a 59-132 record (.308 winning percentage) with zero playoff appearances in those coaching stints. The six quarterbacks above have logged a 70-129-1 record (.353 winning percentage) with two playoff starts in their times with those teams.
By contrast, the six coach-quarterback tandems who began their tenures 3-0 combined to bring their teams 19 playoff berths, seven conference championship game appearances and a couple of Super Bowl rings.
Starting slow doesn't have to be an all-or-nothing proposition. Some successful coach-quarterback tandems began tenures slowly, including DeMeco Ryans and C.J. Stroud, who started 1-2 last season before leading Houston to an AFC South title.
But more often than not, getting things rolling early is a sign of good fortune. Eighteen of the 19 coaches with young quarterbacks who had winning records in their first three games ended up taking that team to the playoffs at some point in their tenure. Only 10 of the 30 who didn't have winning records have taken their teams to the playoffs.
It's still early in the Callahan-Levis partnership, obviously. There's nothing stopping the duo from figuring things out and going on a historic run. But based on the early results, the Titans' duo has an awful lot of history to overcome.
Nick Suss is the Titans beat writer for The Tennessean. Contact Nick at nsuss@gannett.com . Follow Nick on X, the platform formerly called Twitter, @nicksuss.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Tennessee Titans' future in Brian Callahan era looks awfully grim — according to 1 telling stat
Local News
