So far three names have been connected to the Seahawks in regards to the open QB Coach position.  Tom Clements, current QB coach of the Packers.  Carl Smith former QB coach of the Cleveland Browns, and former QB coach for Carroll at USC. Finally our favored son Jim Zorn former QB coach for the Ravens.   One way to look at how effective a coach is to look at the stats of the players , either before or after the Coach, coached them, and see the overall changes those QB’s made.  Let’s take a look at each coach individually.

Tom Clements: Coaching career

• Notre Dame Fighting Irish (QB) (1992-1995)
• New Orleans Saints (QB) (1997-1999)
• Kansas City Chiefs (QB) (2000)
• Pittsburgh Steelers (QB) (2001-2004)
• Buffalo Bills (OC) (2004-2005)
• Green Bay Packers (QB) (2006-present)

For the purposes of this analysis I’m going to ignore, Notre Dame as Clements only coached one QB of note Rick Mirer, and that was only in 1992 after which Mirer was in the NFL.  The Saints I’ll also ignore because none of the players he coached did anything before or after he coached them, dark years for the Saint let’s start with the Chiefs and Elvis Grbac.

As you can see while being coached by Clements, Grbac saw his cmp% go up by 3% his yards go up by 30%, his TD’s go up by 51%, and his Interceptions go down by 15% Next up Kordell Stewart

As you can see here while being coached by Clements, Stewart’s completion percentage went up by 9%, his yards went up by 40%, his TD’s went up by 14%, and his INT’s went down by 17% One thing of note here is Tommy Maddox.  Tommy Maddox, was the QB for PIT after Stewart, he came from nowhere, became a revelation, then after Clements left, disappeared so there are no before or after stats to analyze. Then of course is Aaron Rodgers, he had no stats before Clements, but has been a complete stud. The Total amount of measurable differences made by Clements coaching  is an uptick of about 6% in completion percentage, 35% in yards, 33% in TD’s, and 16% less interceptions Ok next up Carl Smith first proposed by Eric Williams of The News Tribune, Carl smith has previous history with Carroll in that he coached the QB’s in NE, when Carroll, was coach there, and also coached QB’s at USC for a year. Carl Smith:

There is some College experience before this but it’s not really valuable. New Orleans Bobby Hebert

With Smith coaching Hebert his cmp% went slightly down by a little over 2%, however his yards went up 15%, td’s were up 32%, and his int’s went down 40% New Orleans-Jim Everett

Here Smith’s Coaching didn’t make much of a difference although cmp% went up over 8%, yards went up 9%, TD’s a little over 4%, and INT’s went down a little over 2 %  NE Patriots-Drew Bledsoe

Drew Bledsoe is the first real Big name Smith coached, during his coaching which came in the middle of Bledsoe’s career we see a worse comp% although only by .04 of a percent, however 7% more yards passing, 15% more td’s, but also almost 3% MORE int’s. The measurably Net Carl Smith effect appears to be a slight increase in cmp% to the tune of 2%, yards are about even so no effect there, 4% less td’s, and 13% less ints. Also of note are the following names that Carl Smith coached, and amusingly enough are all first round busts, but not enough data to analyze, before/after to analyze. Tim Couch(Cle), Bryon Leftwich(Jac), Brady Quinn(Cle), and Matt Lienart(whom he coached at USC) On the whole not a very impressive resume, and if Carroll hires this yahoo again I’ll scream Now last, but not Least our favored son Jimmy. Jim Zorn: Professional assistant coaching career

• Seattle Seahawks (1997–1998)
• Detroit Lions (1999–2000)
• Seattle Seahawks (2001–2007)
• Baltimore Ravens (2010–2011)

Professional head coaching career

• Washington Redskins (2008–2009

Really 1997-2000 don’t count as coaching Warren Moon, for a year and a half, with half going to Kitna, and Detroits, running out of Charlie Batch really shouldn’t be considered because there is no depth of data here to collect and analyze.  So Starting with Matt. Seattle Seahawks-Matt Hasselbeck

Ok as you can see Matty’s completion percentage was up a little over  5%, yards 31%, TD’s 76%, and INT’s down 18% with Zorn coaching him.  Now in his stint as Redksins HC Washington Redskins-Jason Campbell Note:2007=PreZorn, 2010=Post-Zorn

Here you can see with Zorn coaching Campbell his cmp% went up over 6%, his yards went up almost 35%, his Td’s went up 32%, and his INT’s went up 10%. Now finally Baltimore Ravens-Joe Flacco

Coaching Flacco, Zorn barely nudged his completion % up over 1%, but increased yards 10%, Td’s almost 43%, and decreased INT almost 17% So the Cumulative Zorn effect is a little over 4% in completion percentage, 25% more yards, 50% more TD’s, and 8% less INTs
I would have to say of the three Tom Clements, and Jim Zorn are the obvious no brainer candidates, and Carl Smith should be out based on stats alone of course.