On the heels of a weekend loss to Houston that dropped their record to 1-6, the Titans have relieved Ken Whisenhunt of his head coaching duties, the team announced today in a press release. Mike Mularkey, who had been Tennessee’s assistant head coach and tight ends coach, will take over for Whisenhunt on an interim basis.
“After thoughtful consideration, the decision has been made to relieve Ken Whisenhunt of his head coaching duties,” Titans controlling owner Amy Adams Strunk said in a statement. “We have expected more progress on the field, and I felt it was time to move in a different direction. I would like to thank Ken for his efforts with our team, as he worked very hard to try to move us forward.”
Whisenhunt, who took over as the Titans’ head coach after the 2013 season, led the team to a disappointing 3-20 record during his brief tenure in Tennessee. The club tied for the league’s worst record in 2014, with a 2-14 mark, and had matched Detroit so far this season with an NFL-worst one win through eight weeks.
As for Mularkey, the veteran coach has a pair of head coaching jobs on his resume, having held the role in Buffalo in 2004 and 2005, then again in Jacksonville in 2012. He figures to hang onto the job for the Titans through the end of the 2015 season, and a strong finish this year could put him in the running for the permanent job, though I imagine the team will conduct a full-fledged search this winter.
According to Paul Kuharsky of ESPN.com, Whisenhunt’s five-year deal, which was set to run through 2018, is believed to be worth about $5MM per year. Whisenhunt should continue to earn that money, though some can be offset if he finds a job elsewhere during that time.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
A good football mind who is clearly better suited to a coordinator’s role, although there’s only so much a head coach can do to overcome a dearth of talent. Tennessee just doesn’t have the horses to compete at the moment. He may never get another head coaching gig, but he’ll land on his feet as a coordinator, even if he has to be a position coach for a year or two.
He’s 4-31 over his last 35 games. Besides arguably getting lucky with Kurt Warner, is there any evidence that Whisenhunt is a good NFL coach?