Mike Vrabel Joins 49ers Coaching Legend In Exclusive Club
With their Week 17 rout of the New York Jets, the New England Patriots completed an 8-0 regular season on the road for just the third time in franchise history.
In his first year at the helm in New England, Mike Vrabel also joined a very exclusive club of head coaches to go undefeated on the road in their debut campaign with a team.
“Mike Vrabel joins George Seifert (’89/49ers) as lone 1st-year coaches undefeated on road,” ESPN’s Mike Reiss wrote on Bluesky.
Vrabel is one of the frontrunners for the NFL’s Coach of the Year award but faces plenty of competition.
The former Pro Bowl linebacker rejoined the Patriots last offseason to take over a very different type of situation than former San Francisco 49ers leader George Seifert, as noted by Reiss.
“A notable difference between Seifert and Vrabel is that Seifert had taken over for Bill Walsh, whose (1988) team was 10-6 and had finished in first place in the NFC West,” Reiss wrote in his “notebook” on Bluesky. “Vrabel took over a 4-13 team.”
Seifert joined the Niners in 1980 as their defensive backs coach and held that role for three seasons, before serving as their defensive coordinator for six years from 1983 to 1988. The 85-year-old was San Francisco’s head coach from 1989 to 1996, leading the franchise to a pair of Super Bowl wins, including in his first season.
New England fans can only hope for a similar fate for Vrabel and the Patriots this winter.