NFL Coach of the Year Odds: Can Anyone Catch Dan Campbell?

With Week 8 officially in the books, we are nearly at the halfway point of the 2023 NFL season.

It's been a highly unpredictable two months with weekly twists and turns.

Let's take a look at the current NFL Coach of the Year odds from FanDuel Sportsbook and examine where the front-runners stand entering Week 9.

Here is a full list of the odds, with a breakdown of the top-four coaches.

A Historical Reference: Profile of a Coach of the Year

Before we examine the current front-runners for this year's award, let's take a quick look at what previous winners had to accomplish to earn the honor.

First, repeat winners of the award are uncommon. Since 1990, the award has only gone to a repeat winner 5 out of 32 times. Bill Parcells, Dan Reeves, Bruce Arians, and Ron Rivera all won their second during that stretch, and Bill Belichick won a third. Of those five coaches, only two, Belichick and Rivera, won the award multiple times without changing teams.

Second, you almost always need to win at least 10 games. Dating back to 1990, only three coaches have won the award while winning less than 10 games. Of those three, Brian Daboll in 2022, also had a tie (9-7-1 final record), and Bruce Arians in 2012 took over as interim head coach for the final 12 games of the season, going 9-3. If you don't reach double-digit wins, you are highly unlikely to earn Coach of the Year.

Third, and most importantly, the primary differentiator that all winning coaches share is a team that has drastically improved their record from the previous year. While this may seem obvious, it means that it isn't enough to simply be the coach of a good team. In fact, the award rarely goes to the coach with the best record. Instead, it tends to favor coaches on improved sides. Over the past decade, the winning coach's team earned an average of 5.2 more wins than they did the season before.

In summary, the Coach of the Year award has historically gone to a coach who has not won the award before, on a team that finishes with at least 10 wins, and improves their win total significantly from the previous season.

With that in mind, here are the current front-runners for this season.

Dan Campbell, Detroit Lions (+230)

Campbell finished seventh in last season's Coach of the Year voting, earning one first-place vote. He was the only coach to earn a first-place vote that did not make the playoffs. The Detroit Lions finished that season 9-8 but were sitting at 1-6 entering Week 9. Since then, including their games this season, they are 14-4.

In many ways, Campbell's Coach of the Year campaign is nearly three years in the making. He joined the Lions in 2021 and went 4-19 before the start of their turnaround last season. That turnaround, which rolled over into the Lions being considered favorites to win their division this season, is the basis for the narrative surrounding Campbell's status as the front-runner for the award.

He is on pace to meet all of the criteria outlined above. He has never won the award before, and sitting at 6-2, the Lions are on track to reach double-digit wins. While the Lions' improvement may fall below the 5.2 game average, they are heavy favorites (-1450 per FanDuel Sportsbook) to win the NFC North.

While the Lions may not reach the 5.2 average win improvement benchmark, the idea behind that benchmark is that the team has made significant improvement. In that regard, I don't think anyone would doubt that is the case for Detroit under Campbell.

Given the Lions' favorable rest-of-season schedule -- they face just one team ranked inside the top-12 in Super Bowls odds the rest of the way -- they seem likely to win their first division title since 1993.

With that in mind, Campbell is a deserving favorite for the award. The Lions had a signature win in primetime in their season-opener against the Kansas City Chiefs, they have improved dramatically under Campbell, and he has them well-positioned to finish their season with a historically significant division title.

Campbell's resume for Coach of the Year this season is extremely strong.

Mike McDaniel, Miami Dolphins (+330)

The most likely challenger to Campbell is the Dolphins' Mike McDaniel. Since McDaniel took over as head coach prior to the start of the 2022-23 season, the Miami Dolphins are a combined 15-10. If you only count games in which Tua Tagovailoa was healthy and started, that record improves to 14-7.

McDaniel's campaign for Coach of the Year is based primarily on the historical efficiency of Miami's offense. After scoring 20.1 points per game (PPG) in 2021-22, the Dolphins' scored 23.4 PPG in McDaniel's first season, which included multiple missed games for Tagovailoa. Through eight games this season, the Dolphins lead the NFL in passing yards per game (301.5), rushing yards per game (151.8), and PPG (33.9). If they maintain that pace, they will finish as the 12th-highest-scoring team in NFL history.

That alone isn't enough to take home Coach of the Year though. Since 2000, five teams have finished with a higher PPG than the Dolphins' currently have. Of those teams, only one resulted in a coach winning the award -- Bill Belichick in 2007 when New England finished with 36.8 PPG, the third-highest total in league history.

Examining the criteria above, McDaniel is also on track to meet all three. He has never won the award, the Dolphins are on pace for at least 10 wins, and they could finish with a similar average win improvement as the Lions. The main difference, however, is that McDaniel's path to doing so will be far more difficult than Campbell's.

Miami's remaining schedule includes games against the Chiefs, Dallas Cowboys, Baltimore Ravens, and Buffalo Bills. They are allowing 25.5 points per game (25th in the league) and have been soundly defeated in their two games against elite opposition so far this season against Buffalo and the Philadelphia Eagles.

The Dolphins are also favorites to win their division (-180), but their odds of doing so are narrower than Detroit's by a significant margin.

For McDaniel, there is opportunity in that difficult path. If he can guide the Dolphins to an AFC East title, finish with a similar record to the Lions despite facing a more difficult schedule, and maintain a historically efficient offense while doing so, he can certainly be named Coach of the Year.

Robert Saleh, New York Jets (+600)

Entering Week 9, Saleh is in his own mini-tier for Coach of the Year odds. He sits below Campbell and McDaniel, but significantly above the next closest coach, DeMeco Ryans of the Houston Texans.

In Saleh's first two seasons as the head coach of the New York Jets, they went a combined 11-23. Like Campbell, Saleh's resume for the award is best viewed as the culmination of a three-year project. After going 4-13 in his first season, the Jets improved to 7-10 last season, and this was supposed to be the season where they fixed their weakness at quarterback and ascended to the elite tier of the league.

Aaron Rodgers' Achilles injury in Week 1 changed all of that. If Saleh takes home the award now, it will likely be on the basis of a narrative that he overcame tremendous adversity to guide the Jets to a respectable season and a playoff appearance.

So far, sitting at 4-3 with wins over both the Eagles and Bills, he can still do so. Due to the Jets' quarterback situation, Saleh may be able to underperform the historic profile of a Coach of the Year and still win.

Examining those criteria, he checks the box for never having won the award, but the odds that the Jets reach 10 wins is unlikely, their regular-season wins total odds sit at 8.5, per FanDuel Sportsbook. They can improve on last season's win total of seven, but they are unlikely to do so by a significant margin. They are also long shots to win their division (+950).

The other wrinkle in this equation for Saleh is that one of the two coaches with better odds than him, Mike McDaniel, is also in the AFC East. A situation where the Jets sneak into the playoffs but still finish third in their division, which Miami wins, would complicate the case for Saleh winning the award over McDaniel.

That said, it's certainly still possible, and a comparable situation happened just last year. Brian Daboll was named Coach of the Year after the New York Giants finished third in the NFC East behind both the Eagles and Cowboys. Eagles coach Nick Sirianni finished fifth in the voting despite the Eagles winning the NFC East and improving their win total from the previous season by five.

If the Jets remain competitive and ultimately manage to secure a playoff spot, a repeat of last season's outcome is not out of the question.

DeMeco Ryans, Houston Texans (+1300)

Ryans is the most likely of the longshots to win Coach of the Year, but he is a long shot for a reason.

The three coaches in front of him all have solid paths to winning the award. For Ryans to win, he would likely need the Lions, Dolphins, and/or Jets to crumble in the second half of the season in addition to the Texans continuing to improve.

The one criterion that Ryans will almost certainly have an edge over the front-runners on is win improvement. In his first year as a head coach, Ryans' Texans have already equaled their win total from last season (3) with 10 games left to play. Houston's win total sits at 7.5, and barring a collapse, they will almost certainly improve drastically from their 3-14 record last season and win more than four games for the first time since 2019.

The Texans' improvement under Ryans has been evident. After finishing last season ranked 31st in points allowed (24.7 per game) and points for (17.0 per game), Houston has been a significantly better side on both sides of the ball this season. They are allowing just 18.3 points per game (-6.4 from last season) and scoring 21.1 points per game (+4.1 from last season). In terms of net points per game, they moved from -7.7 last season to +2.9 this season.

Houston did have an infusion of talent on both sides of the ball in the draft, but that is still a remarkable improvement in just seven games under Ryans.

While Ryans has a legitimate case on the basis of the Texans' improvement, the overall results for Houston this season may not be good enough for him to win. Even playing better football, the Texans are unlikely to win at least 10 games this season. They remain long shots to win their division (+750) due to the strength of the Jacksonville Jaguars, and their odds of making the playoffs (+260) are slim in a loaded AFC.

For Ryans' chances of winning the award, a best-case, realistic scenario would be Houston going 6-4 in the second half of the season to finish at 9-8 and secure the seventh seed in the AFC. Their relatively easy schedule makes that a possibility, but even in that scenario, Ryans might also need both the Lions and Dolphins to not win their respective divisions to secure the award.

Other Longshots

• Pete Carroll, Seattle Seahawks (+1500)
• Doug Pederson, Jacksonville Jaguars (+1500)
• John Harbaugh, Baltimore Ravens (+1600)
• Nick Sirianni, Philadelphia Eagles (+1600)
• Mike Tomlin, Pittsburgh Steelers (+2600)
• Kyle Shanahan, San Francisco 49ers (+2600)
• Kevin Stefanski, Cleveland Browns (+3400)
• Arthur Smith, Atlanta Falcons (+3100)

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The above author is a FanDuel employee and is not eligible to compete in public daily fantasy contests or place sports betting wagers on FanDuel. The advice provided by the author does not necessarily represent the views of FanDuel. Taking the author's advice will not guarantee a successful outcome. You should use your own judgment when participating in daily fantasy contests or placing sports wagers.