Gus Bradley’s Seat Is Getting Warm…or is it?

….or is it? Well, according to Erik Lambert over at NFL Mocks, Gus Bradley’s seat is getting just a tad toasty after the Jacksonville Jaguars started the season 1-7 with their latest loss to the Miami Dolphins on Sunday.

I appreciate Lambert’s work and particularly like that he’s included former two former Jacksonville defensive coordinators (Mel Tucker and Mike Smith) in his hot seat analysis, but I simply cannot agree with his assessment of Gus Bradley at this point. Here’s what he had to say:

"Yes he took over a bad team and it takes time to rebuild but one would think that Gus Bradley could’ve found a way to make at least a little progress with the Jacksonville Jaguars have one and a half seasons.  Instead he’s 1-7 in 2014 and his team followed their first victory of the year by getting hammered 27-13 by Miami at home.  There is only so much good faith a head coach receives in the NFL.  Bradley is running out fast."

While Bradley certainly hasn’t led the Jaguars to a quick turnaround (that some of us hoped beyond hope would happen), he isn’t on the same timetable that Mike Mularkey was on when he stepped into the role just two years ago…and was promptly fired.

GM Dave Caldwell is committed to Gus Bradley long term and the Jaguars have got to be thinking long term after another poor start to the season. Bradley has some faults as a coach, timeouts and challenges chief among them, but he is currently getting a young, inexperienced roster to overachieve. After a tough start to the season the Jaguars have been competitive over the past three games, with mistakes making this team 1-7 instead of 3-5.

Now, if the Jaguars regress back to early 2014 form and continue to just a 1-15 record then we’ll start talking about Bradley’s seat getting warm, but right now things are kind of on track for the Jaguars. The record isn’t what they want and there are far less “winnable” games on the schedule now, but if the Jaguars keep getting better – even if they keep losing – then don’t expect the team to pull the plug.

This is only year two under Dave and Gus and it’s year one with Blake Bortles (a year before they wanted to start him). If Bradley’s seat is getting warm right now then it’s going to have to be licked in demon flame before Bradley is fired, because he’s still got a long way to go with the team and this rebuild.

This is a process. The Jaguars just need to keep getting better.