For 7th year in a row, Sean McVay is NFL’s youngest head coach

The Los Angeles Rams made history when they hired Sean McVay in 2017, making him the youngest head coach the NFL has ever seen. So young, in fact, that McVay continued to be the league’s youngest coach in 2018. And 2019. And 2020.

And 2021. And 2022. And now, with the Cardinals completing the latest coaching cycle by hiring Jonathan Gannon... 2023.

For the seventh year in a row, McVay is the NFL’s youngest head coach. His former offensive coordinator Kevin O’Connell is the second-youngest, having been born a full eight months earlier than McVay. Shane Steichen, the new head coach of the Colts, is two weeks younger than O’Connell.

Two more former McVay proteges, Zac Taylor and Brandon Staley, are both 40 and sitting in the top-10 of youngest head coaches.

With Gannon (40), that makes nine current coaches who are 40 or younger, but still none younger than McVay. Interestingly, McVay could retire at a younger age than most coaches who get their first job leading an NFL team.

On the other end of the spectrum, Pete Carroll is 71, Bill Belichick is 70, and Andy Reid is the third-oldest active coach at 64. So we’ve yet to really see any advantage or disadvantage based on age, even though teams have been chasing “the next McVay” for years.

Six years, to be exact.