In my book "Week One NFL Winners," I'm very negative on Shurmur.
However, facts are facts, and Shurmur's recent career accomplishments have me rethinking my position. So let's take a look at Shurmur's recent history. Since 2013, he's been the offensive coordinator for two playoff teams: the 2013 Eagles and the 2017 Vikings. Philadelphia was 4-12 SU the year before Shurmur arrived, and 10-6 in Shurmur's first season with the team, a six-win increase. Granted, head coach Chip Kelly had a lot to do with that team's success, but Shurmur did hold the title of coordinator and titles do mean something.
In 2012, before Shurmur arrived, Philadelphia averaged 17 points and 354 yards per game. In the team's first year under Shurmur (and Chip Kelly), the Eagles averaged 27 points and 408 yards per game. That's a pretty hefty jump.
In 2016, Shurmur went to Minnesota as their tight ends coach, but was bumped up to interim offensive coordinator when Norv Turner quit after seven games. That team finished the year 8-8. 2017 was Shurmur's first full season as Minnesota's OC, and that team went 13-3, a five-win increase.
Now Minnesota does have a decent defense, and that side of the ball does get a lot of credit for the increase in wins. But look how the offense improved: The 2016 Vikings averaged 20 points and 315 yards per game. Under Shurmur in 2017, the team averaged 24 points and 357 yards per game. A substantial improvement.
Even more telling was the job Shurmur did with the team's quarterbacks. In 2016, Sam Bradford had a career year with Shurmur's Minnesota Vikings, completing 71% of his passes (1st in the league), with a rating of 99.3 (6th), and a TD/INT ratio of 20/5. He also played pretty well in the first game of 2017 before he was injured.
In 2017, Case Keenum also had a career year playing for Shurmur, completing 67.6% of his passes (2nd), with a rating of 98.3 (7th), and a TD/INT ratio of 22/7. The similarity between his stats and Bradford's are uncanny.
Bradford actually played for Shurmur in Philadelphia in 2015. He went 7-7 SU as a starter with a ratio of 19/14. In games that he has started and finished since 2015, all with Shurmur on the coaching staff, Bradford is 15-15 SU (7-7 with Philadelphia, 8-8 with Minnesota). That's not earth-shattering, however, before he hooked up with Shurmur in 2015, the injury-prone Bradford was 19-30-1 SU as a starter. So Shurmur turned Bradford from a losing quarterback into a .500 quarterback. That's quite an improvement.
Case Keenum was 8-15 SU before Shurmur and 13-4 SU after. So Shurmur turned him from a losing quarterback into a winning quarterback. That's a tremendous improvement.
Also, Minnesota head coach Mike Zimmer is a defensive guy. He doesn't know anything about offense. So while you could make an argument that Shurmur's accomplishments in Philadelphia were due mainly to Chip Kelly, in Minnesota that wasn't the case. With last year's Vikings team, Shurmur was the top dog of that offense.
Mike Shula is the new offensive coordinator, although I'm sure Shurmur will call plays. (Shurmur will be the Chip Kelly to Shula's Pat Shurmur, if you can follow that.) Shula spent the last five years coordinating Carolina's offense. He took a lot of flak from the fans, but Carolina made the playoffs in four out of five years with Shula calling plays. The only other teams to do that are Green Bay, Kansas City, New England, Pittsburgh, and Seattle.
New York's new defensive coordinator James Bettcher could be a sneaky-good hire. He was Arizona's defensive coordinator the last three years and his defense ranked in the top-5 in total yards all three years, and in the top-5 in yards per play in two out of three years. Bettcher loves to blitz and I expect we'll see quite a bit of that from the Giants this year. Remember, this is a team whose defense carried them to the playoffs just two years ago.