This was an article planned before the Klint Kubiak hiring by the Las Vegas Raiders, but the free-agency frenzy was allowed to settle first. The broader point risks getting lost amid the hype surrounding new coaches and new players.
One thing recent years have made clear is that age plays a significant role in a coach’s potential for success. Pete Carroll and Bill Belichick are, for all intents and purposes, Hall of Famers, but both lost their edge in their 70s, combining for just seven wins against 22 losses last season.
The NFL is a young man’s game…
There is a reason only two head coaches in NFL history, George Halas and Marv Levy, have coached into their 70s. Coaching is a young- to middle-aged man’s game. Staying on the cutting edge of new systems is demanding, and as coaches age, it becomes increasingly difficult to pull off the all-nighters of film review and preparation that the job requires.
We have seen this dynamic play out in the recent success of coaches such as Sean McVay of the Rams, Kyle Shanahan of the 49ers and Mike McDonald of the Seahawks.
That generational trend gives the Raiders a significant advantage in the AFC West. Head coach Klint Kubiak is 38 years old, while Jim Harbaugh and Sean Payton are both 62 and Andy Reid is 68. Realistically, each of those coaches probably has somewhere between two and five years remaining at the top level.
The Raiders will soon have their own promising duo…
If the selection of Fernando Mendoza in the draft pays off, the Raiders could have a coach-quarterback combination capable of sustained success for 10 to 15 years. That kind of continuity is what wins in the NFL. We saw it with Brady and Belichick, Landry and Staubach, Noll and Bradshaw, Walsh and Montana, and Payton and Brees.
That timeline may even give the Raiders an edge over division rivals like the Rams and 49ers. Shanahan has cycled through a handful of starting quarterbacks since joining San Francisco, and the McVay-Stafford partnership will have only one, maybe two years at most.
Related: Latest Raiders mock draft showcases aggressive trades
In three to five years, most AFC West opponents will be searching for new head coaches. Meanwhile, Patrick Mahomes will be approaching the later stages of his career in his mid-30s. The Raiders, by contrast, should have their quarterback and coach pairing squarely in their prime.
It is worth remembering that franchise success tends to run in cycles, and those cycles can be long. From the 1930s through the mid-1960s, the Bears were a premier franchise. The Cleveland Browns dominated a similar era. For decades, the Patriots were a laughingstock before becoming the defining dynasty of the NFL for 20 years. After their run of AFC Championship appearances in the 1990s, the Bills spent the better part of the next two decades as an afterthought. The Raiders, Cowboys and Dolphins were among the premier franchises of the 1970s and early 1980s, and all three have struggled for the past quarter century.
Following the Ravens’ blueprint?
A new quarterback and head coach can reverse a long cycle of futility, and the Raiders appear positioned to do exactly that. What has happened between the Ravens and Raiders lately strikes me as two ships passing in the night. For roughly 25 years, Baltimore has been a model organization, with two Super Bowl titles, multiple AFC Championship appearances and consistent AFC North success, while the Raiders have been largely irrelevant.
This offseason, the Raiders made significant moves in free agency and will hold the No. 1 overall pick. The Ravens, meanwhile, lost nine free agents under circumstances that raised eyebrows around the league. It just might be a changing of the guard.
*Top Photo: Ramble Illustration/Getty Images