Jaguars fire Gus Bradley: 5 replacements Jacksonville should hire
By John Buhler
4. Kyle Shanahan, Atlanta Falcons offensive coordinator
This is something NFL people need to come to terms with: Atlanta Falcons offensive coordinator Kyle Shanahan will be an NFL head coach before the end of the decade. It doesn’t matter who his father is, Shanahan’s Falcons offense might be the very best in football.
Atlanta is the fourth offensive coordinator gig Shanahan has had in the NFL. He had success in the Houston Texans with Matt Schaub under center, while his tenures with the Washington Redskins and the Cleveland Browns were largely underwhelming.
To be fair, Atlanta has had solid offensive personnel for the entire Matt Ryan era (2008-present), but what Shanahan has done to the Falcons running game and offensive line in less than two seasons cannot go unnoticed.
In 2014 under offensive coordinator Dirk Koetter, Atlanta was deplorable up front and the running game. Ryan threw for a ton of yards, but spent half of the game lying on his back behind a porous offensive line in an unbalanced Air Coryell attack.
Shanahan brought the Shanahan family zone block scheming and the West Coast offense to Atlanta. The Falcons immediately became a strong rushing team with a top-five offensive line in football. Ryan was the NFC Offensive Player of the Month in September in only his second year in the Shanahan West Coast offense.
Mechanically, Ryan and Bortles are vastly different quarterbacks. Ryan is slender and more accurate. Bortles is bigger with a stronger arm. The Shanahan ZBS would turn around Jacksonville’s bad offensive line over night. A Bortles/Shanahan pairing could challenge the famous 1990s Jaguars tandem of Mark Brunell and Tom Coughlin.