NFL Hot Seat: 5 coaches who must win in Week 7

How long can a head coach keep his job if his team continues to be mediocre? That’s a tough question to answer, but for the Detroit Lions, they might need to think about a change sooner than later if they struggle again in 2016.

Head coach Jim Caldwell has done a respectable job as the head coach during his time with Detroit, going 11-5 in his first season with the Lions before going 7-9 last year and starting 2016 with a 3-3 record.

While 3-3 isn’t a bad start for a team that lost Calvin Johnson, the team needs to be able to win prove-it games. The Washington Redskins aren’t an elite franchise, but they’re a respectable enough one that the Lions need to beat to prove to the rest of the NFL that they’re for real this year.

If the Lions lose on Sunday, they’ll go into a tough four-game stretch that includes two games against the Minnesota Vikings with the possibility of coming out of that stretch with a 4-7 or 5-6 record. That kind of mediocrity isn’t something you want from your team in its third year under a head coach.

A loss to Washington on Sunday isn’t going to doom Caldwell, but this is definitely a game that management could look at by the end of the year to determine whether they want to move forward with their head coach.