Titans fire coach Callahan, former DLS player, after 1-5 start to second season

By TERESA M WALKER NASHVILLE Tenn AP The Tennessee Titans fired former De La Salle quarterback Brian Callahan on Monday after a - start to his second season making him the first NFL head coach ousted this season Chad Brinker the Titans president of football operations stated unit executives had extended conversations with controlling owner Amy Adams Strunk and general manager Mike Borgonzi before meeting with Callahan on Monday morning to tell him that Tennessee was making a change While we are committed to a victim and strategic plan to build a sustainable winning football effort we have not demonstrated sufficient advancement Brinker revealed in a message Our players fans and locality deserve a football company that achieves a standard we are not right now meeting and we are committed to making the hard decisions necessary to reach and maintain that standard The Titans did not instantly say who would be the interim coach They host former Tennessee coach Mike Vrabel and his New England Patriots - on Sunday Callahan went - which featured a -game skid The former backup quarterback for national power De La Salle Callahan s father is former Oakland Raiders head coach Bill Callahan the Titans offensive line coach He becomes just the second coach fired during the season by this franchise since relocating to Tennessee in joining Ken Whisenhunt Whisenhunt had a - record when fired in November with a stint that also included a -game skid to end the season The Titans had stated they sought to see improvement this season with Callahan going into his second season as a first-time head coach and with a rookie quarterback in Cam Ward Yet Callahan had to hand off play-calling duties after dropping to - and the offense struggling Even the change in play-caller didn t help The Titans have scored only points and are averaging yards per play Only the Jets the Bills in Josh Allen s rookie year the Browns the Raiders in JaMarcus Russell s last season and the ers have scored fewer than points and yards per play through six games in the past seasons Of the NFL coaches who have coached at least games or more since the NFL-AFL merger in Callahan ranks th with a winning percentage The only coaches with worse winning percentages were Jim Ringo Marty Mornhinweg Chris Palmer and Rod Dowhower Related Articles ers Fred Warner already looking to legendary return from season-ending ankle injury Inman things that caught my eye in ers loss besides missing-man formation on Warner play ers overview card Pass-game miscues add to the misery after Warner injury Is Shanahan sideline spat the beginning of the end for Jennings and the ers Kurtenbach Fred Warner s season-ending injury is a current point for the ers season The Titans knew that this would be a rebuilding year and Brinker explained at the start of training camp that improvement was the one sign they were looking for They have played at least seven rookies in each tournament this season led by Ward the No draft pick Callahan was hired in January for his work with quarterbacks including Cincinnati s Joe Burrow also a No pick in But Ward is the most-sacked quarterback in the NFL with already including a pair of games with six sacks each following a - loss to the Raiders This marks the fourth time in five years that a group that picked a quarterback with the No selection fired the coach during the season Callahan joins Matt Eberflus Chicago Frank Reich Carolina and Urban Meyer Jaguars in that group Hue Jackson was also fired by Cleveland in and former Titans coach Jeff Fisher by the Rams in in the same situation