When NFL coaches get fired

• Tony Dungy: The big thing is not to feel desperation
• Thursday night game between San Diego and Kansas City makes hot-seat coaches
• Andy Reid showing signs of desperation

There's a chill in the air, the NFL season has reached the halfway point, and Brian Billick has ripped a page off his calendar. He knows what comes next.

"It's November," Billick says, "so two things are going to happen: I've got to put my boat up and coaches are going to get fired."

Billick, an analyst for the NFL Network, knows about the unemployment line for NFL coaches. He guided the Baltimore Ravens to a Super Bowl championship during the 2000 season, then was fired when his team finished 6-10 in 2007.

And like any NFL coach worth his playbook, Billick can quote that cowboy-hat-wearing sage and coaching legend Bum Phillips, who once said, "There are two kinds of coaches – those who have been fired and those who are going to get fired."

This season, like any other in the NFL, there is no shortage of coaches battling to save their jobs:

Andy Reid, in his 14th season with the Philadelphia Eagles, is trying to steer his year – and career – away from the guardrail. He fired defensive coordinator Juan Castillo during a bye week and, with his team 3-4, has been contemplating a quarterback change from Michael Vick, who will start again Sunday, to third-round draft pick Nick Foles.

Romeo Crennel is proving his 24-40 record as a head coach in Cleveland was no fluke. He is 1-6 with the Kansas City Chiefs, who are the only team in NFL history never to have held a lead in its first seven games. When asked why Pro Bowl running back Jamaal Charles touched the ball only eight times Sunday in a loss to the Raiders, Crennel sent Chiefs fans into a tizzy by saying, "I'm not exactly sure."

Carolina Panthers coach Ron Rivera, beaten out the door by fired general manager Marty Hurney, must pin his hopes on quarterback Cam Newton, who is so frustrated by losing that two weeks ago he asked the media and fans for suggestions on how to stop it. The Panthers are 1-6.

Jason Garrett of the Dallas Cowboys received a vote of confidence this week from owner Jerry Jones, but every coach knows those come with expiration dates. Once thought to be coaching's next boy wonder, Garrett is 11-12 over the past season and a half, and he can't fix mistake-prone quarterback Tony Romo, whose turnovers have led to a 3-4 record .

San Diego Chargers coach Norv Turner hasn't made the playoffs in two years, and, entering Thursday night's game against Crennel and the Chiefs, had lost three games in a row.

Wait, there's more: With a change of ownership and front office at the Cleveland Browns, coach Pat Shurmur is likely gone at the end of the season, and Chan Gailey can't seem to get the Buffalo Bills sorted out, even after the team spent $100 million on defensive talent in the offseason.

Let the questions begin: Who will be fired? Will they get canned now, or at the end of the season? Will a few somehow push the right buttons to spark a turnaround and save their jobs?

Tony Dungy, another former Super Bowl title, says he sees a hint of desperation in Philadelphia, where -- as fans chant, "Fire Andy!" -- Reid is tinkering and insisting that no job is safe. Dungy says that's the first sign that a coach knows he's in trouble.

"You're starting to see the signs of desperation," Dungy says. "And Andy says, 'We're going to evaluate everything.' There's a lot of pressure to win, but I always think doing what you've done and been successful with over the years is the way to go.

"The big thing is not to feel that desperation of 'Oh, I have to make changes.' When you do that, it's usually the first sign that it's going to go downhill."

There is irony in Dungy's words. He was fired in 2001 from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, his first head-coaching job, for being too conservative on offense. The problem? Dungy had refused to tinker with the formula that had made him successful.

For many NFL coaches, whispers start almost with the first losing season, or maybe just a losing streak. Some, like Bill Belichick of the New England Patriots, are immune. With four championships and the Hall of Fame presumably waiting, Belichick probably will leave on his own terms.

New York Giants coach Tom Coughlin is safe, too. But he was almost fired when his rigid rules nearly sparked a players revolt. He then was almost forced to quit by his wife and children, who were angry at the abuse he took from the media and players in his first two seasons with the Giants. But two Super Bowl titles later, Coughlin is beloved by his players and fans.

Living Week To Week

For the rest, however, the hot seat awaits, no matter how much they refuse to acknowledge it. But the coaching mindset helps many through adversity.

Coaches live from week to week, preparing their teams for the next opponent, playing the game, and then quickly focusing on the next team up. They preach a "one-game-at-a-time" philosophy to their players, and use it themselves when they don't know how much longer they have.

To an NFL coach, redemption is only a Sunday away. But, then again, so, is a potential firing.

To make a point, Billick selects one of the least likely candidates to be fired, Mike Smith, whose Atlanta Falcons are the NFL's lone unbeaten team at 7-0.

"He's telling his team now that he doesn't want anybody looking down the road," Billick says. "If he hears anybody talking about 16-0, they're in hot water.

"The same thing you're focused on when you have an undefeated record is the same thing you think about when you're on the hot seat. You're thinking about the next week."

Still, coaches are human.

"Are they thinking about it? Yeah," Billick says. "Are they focused on it? Yeah. But they don't address it, not even to their team. You fight it tooth and nail, every step of the way. You always feel that you can turn it around."

Some actually do turn it around. Jim Fassel, now coaching in the United Football League, appeared on the verge of losing his job with the New York Giants in 2000. His team had lost two games in a row and the locker room was laced with dissension. The defense pointed fingers at an offense that couldn't score; special teams were a disaster.

With the season teetering just before Thanksgiving, Fassel stood in front of the media and guaranteed his team was going to the postseason.

"I'm pushing all of my chips to the center of the table," he said. "This team is going to the playoffs."

Fans embraced the blind optimism. The media panned him. And the players appreciated that Fassel was taking all of the pressure on himself.

"We had lost to Detroit and our special teams were terrible and cost us the game," Fassel recalled. "So, I bought our core group of 15 special teams players together and said, 'I'm going to cut two of you each week until we play better.'" Fassel had just cut the special teams MVP, "so they knew I was serious."

The Giants won the last five games of the regular season and zipped through the postseason, only to lose to Billick's Ravens in the Super Bowl.

Fassel, eventually fired when his team lost the final eight games in 2003, got his players' attention that season on the brink. It's not an easy thing to do. When Billick was fired by the Ravens after nine seasons, it was widely contended that players had tuned him out.

"Even if players like you, it's tough," Billick says. "They think, 'Is this guy going to be here? How much do I have to listen to him?'"

But it's not just the head coach whose future is at stake, as former Minnesota Vikings coach Dennis Green points out. Many teams have more than 20 assistant coaches, whose status is generally tied to the head coach. By extension, relationships with players that assistant coaches have developed are threatened.

"The quarterbacks coach has a particular quarterback he likes," Green says. "The linebackers coach has a linebacker who he has developed. When the head coach goes, all of those relationships can get pushed aside. The ripple effect is what affects the team the most."

In the end, everyone involved knows the bottom line. Sometimes, extenuating circumstances such as an injury to a key player or a bad break on a game-swinging play won't matter.

"It's perception," Billick says. "Tom Coughlin is a classic case. When they are winning, he's authoritative, the captain of the ship. When they are losing, he's rigid, non-communicative, can't relate to players. He's the same guy. It's just that the perception is different, based on winning and losing."

This week, Turner was asked if he believed his job was in jeopardy.

"You're coaching on a week-to-week basis," he said Monday. "I'm coaching to do the best job I can to get our team ready to play. All those other conversations, they're going to take place. You know they're going to take place."