New Stat Alert: The Buddy System

Talking about the debate that just won't die: Is Mike Vrabel the only coach hiring his buddies at a high rate?

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On Monday, the Tennessee Titans did the right thing by relieving Craig Aukerman of his Special Teams Coordinator duties. I am sure it was tough, because while he wasn’t a “Vrabel guy” initially, it was clear that Vrabel welcomed him into the Vrabel Circle of Trust. You do not keep a guy that bad at his job for that long, having not developed some strong buddy relationship.

Justin Melo wrote a great article detailing some candidates for the open coordinator position. In doing my research for “The Buddy System” I came across Izzo’s name as well and was going to write about him in detail today, but instead for more details and background on him, just read Melo’s article. Save me time and helps him buy bags of milk for his moose.

I just mentioned above “The Buddy System”, and paid subscribers will be able to learn about that and also a very important section at the end of the article. If you’re not paid, I am going to leave you with Larry Izzo’s rankings in Rick Goesslin’s Special Teams Rankings and Special Teams specific weighted DVOA from every year he’s been a coordinator:

• 2016 (Houston): 23rd in Goesslin’s | 30^th DVOA

• 2017 (Houston): 26th | 31st 

• 2021 (Seattle): 3^rd | 6^th

• 2022 (Seattle): 2^nd | 2^nd

Seattle under Izzo is currently 9^th in DVOA for 2023, while the Titans are ranked 26^th.

The Buddy System