The NFL’s head coaching tree got a major shake-up on Tuesday when the Baltimore Ravens announced that they’d parted ways with John Harbaugh. Harbaugh had been the team’s head coach for each of the previous 18 seasons, winning a Super Bowl and an AP Coach of the Year award and helping develop Lamar Jackson into a two-time MVP. He’s immediately become the hottest name in the coaching cycle, reportedly drawing interest from each of the teams with openings besides Baltimore…and some teams without an opening.
The fact that the Ravens fired Harbaugh came as a surprise, though Baltimore had a miserable 2025 season. The Ravens have been contenders for several seasons, winning four of the seven division titles between 2018 and 2024 and making the playoffs two additional times, but they only advanced to the AFC Championship Game once. 2024 was arguably the most heart-wrenching: Baltimore had the opportunity to tie its Divisional Round matchup against the Buffalo Bills late in the fourth quarter, but tight end Mark Andrews dropped Jackson’s pass. In 2025, Jackson battled injuries and didn’t perform to his usual standards, but he still gave his team a chance to win late in Week 18 until rookie kicker Tyler Loop’s missed field goal cost the Ravens a playoff berth and Harbaugh his job.
Still, few head coaching opportunities are ever as appealing as Baltimore’s. The Ravens have a championship-ready roster, headlined by a perennial MVP candidate in Jackson, a top-10 running back in league history in Derrick Henry, and a defense stacked with playmakers like two-time All-Pro safety Kyle Hamilton. Baltimore could still use some improvements in the secondary, but as long as Jackson is healthy, the Ravens — and their new coach — should be expected to play deep into January every season.
Who will that coach be? Let’s break down the odds on DraftKings Sportsbook.
Ravens next head coach odds
As of Thursday morning, two men had solidified themselves as Baltimore’s top candidate. One was the second-most highly-touted head coach fired as part of the cycle, the Cleveland Browns’ Kevin Stefanski (+350), and the other is Los Angeles Chargers defensive coordinator Jesse Minter (+350), who has some experience with the franchise in a variety of defensive positions between 2017 and 2020. The other names with shorter than +500 odds are former Miami Dolphins head coach Brian Flores (+450) and current Ravens offensive coordinator Todd Monken (+450).
Reportedly, the Ravens have requested interviews with Flores, Seattle Seahawks offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak (+500), Kansas City Chiefs offensive coordinator Matt Nagy (+1000), Denver Broncos defensive coordinator and former head coach Vance Joseph (+1300), Broncos passing game coordinator Davis Webb, and Dolphins defensive coordinator Anthony Weaver.
With their team in win-now mode, Baltimore general manager Eric DeCosta and owner Steve Bisciotti might opt to replace their experienced head coach with another one, so it makes sense that a trio of former head coaches (Stefanski, Flores, and Mike McCarthy) are among the six candidates with the shortest odds. Stefanski is a two-time Coach of the Year who helped lead the Browns to the playoffs twice, winning a Wild Card Round game once, and he coaxed Baker Mayfield into, at that point, the best season of his career. Flores’ tenure with the Miami Dolphins didn’t offer quite so many highs, as he never made the postseason with the team, but he did help Tua Tagovailoa make some strides in his sophomore season. McCarthy is the most experienced: he’s best known for coaching Aaron Rodgers to a Super Bowl title with the Green Bay Packers, but he also helped Dak Prescott enjoy the best season of his career in 2023.
If the Ravens opt to go for a new hire, Minter’s status as the front-runner makes some sense. Minter is part of Jim Harbaugh’s coaching tree, both at Michigan and with the Chargers, and he helped Baltimore finish with a top-six scoring defense in each of his four seasons as a defensive assistant. More recently, he crafted a passing game that helped Justin Herbert lead Los Angeles to back-to-back postseason appearances, including a tremendous effort in 2025 in which both of the Chargers’ starting offensive tackles suffered season-ending injuries and both of their top two running backs missed significant time. Monken would be the in-house option as the Ravens’ offensive play-caller, while Kubiak would represent another high-upside offensive mind as the play-caller for a Seahawks team that finished with the NFC’s best record.
Among the names at +600 and +700, Kliff Kingsbury is the only one with previous head coaching experience, having led the Arizona Cardinals from 2019 to 2022, and while his four-season stint in the desert only produced one playoff appearance, he did coax a pair of Pro Bowl seasons out of Kyler Murray. More recently, Kingsbury also helped Jayden Daniels — a player with a similar play-style to that of Jackson — lead the Washington Commanders to the NFC Championship Game as a rookie in 2024. If Baltimore instead opts for a defensive-minded head coach to help bring that unit to the elite offense’s level, Jeff Hafley could be a good fit, having masterminded the Green Bay Packers to a top-11 scoring defense and a playoff berth in each of the past two seasons.
The long list of long-shot candidates includes a wide variety of coaching experience, but it’s worth noting that the Ravens have requested an interview with Saleh, who compiled just a 20-36 record across three-plus seasons with the New York Jets and never made the postseason. Like Hafley, Saleh is a defensive-minded coach whose San Francisco 49ers, and, to a lesser extent, Jets, teams proved to be among the league’s best and most consistent defenses. The quartet of names at +7500 (Jason Garrett, Bill Belichick, Mike Kafka, and Jon Gruden) haven’t been linked to much real buzz, but Belichick at least has experience coaching an AFC contender as the linchpin of the New England Patriots’ dynasty. For his part, Belichick has repeatedly confirmed his commitment to the University of North Carolina, where he is currently the head coach.
