Cardinals fire head coach Jonathan Gannon after 3 seasons

The Arizona Cardinals fired head coach Jonathan Gannon on Monday following the end of his third season on the job, the team announced.

ESPN’s Adam Schefter first reported the news.

The firing comes after the Cardinals’ 37-20 loss to the Los Angeles Rams on Sunday. The head coach leaves Arizona with a 15-36 mark.

Cardinals owner Michael Bidwill on the firing of head coach Jonathan Gannon:

“We were going in the wrong direction it seemed like. It came down to wins and losses.” pic.twitter.com/DdPZnuUqrr

— Tyler Drake (@Tdrake4sports) January 5, 2026

“We were going in the wrong direction it seemed like. It came down to wins and losses,” owner Michael Bidwill said Monday. “We’ve won one game since Week 2 of the NFL season, and it just felt like it went too far and it was just time to go in a different direction.”

General manager Monti Ossenfort will conduct the search for a new head coach.

Gannon’s tenure in Arizona comes to an end with the Cardinals staring at a 3-14 record (0-6 in the NFC West) in 2025. That’s the most losses in a season in franchise history and more defeats than the other three NFC West teams endured combined.

The Cardinals at 3-5 looked to have turned things around with a dominant Monday Night Football win over the Dallas Cowboys but have gone 0-9 since retooling during the bye week. In six of those final nine games, the Cardinals allowed at least 30 points. four of those lopsided losses came against divisional foes.

Coming to town as part of a complete rebuild alongside Ossenfort in 2023 — and following a Super Bowl run with the Philadelphia Eagles as the defensive coordinator — the first-time head coach helped set a new culture.

The buy-in was quick within the locker room. The production on the field was not, with the Cardinals finishing 4-13 in Gannon’s first season.

Not having quarterback Kyler Murray — who was still recovery from a torn ACL suffered the year prior — didn’t help, neither did the clear talent deficiency on the 53-man roster.

And while Gannon doubled the win total in Year 2, it was very much a what-could-have-been season for Arizona.

Starting out 6-4 and holding a lead in the NFC West before a Week 11 bye, the Cardinals fell flat the rest of the way to an 8-9 finish.

They narrowly missed the playoffs but raised the expectations heading into Year 3 under Gannon. A busy offseason filled with key free-agent additions and draft picks only added to the hype.

Then came the regular season.

After starting out 2-0 behind close calls against New Orleans and Carolina, Arizona turned in a five-game losing streak, all coming by one score.

Under Gannon, the Cardinals made NFL history as the first team to lose three straight games after leading by at least seven points heading into the fourth quarter.

On top of piling up the losses this year, Gannon was also fined $100,000 by the team for his sideline altercation with Emari Demercado after the running back dropped the ball short of the end zone in an eventual loss to the Tennessee Titans.

Arizona is now on the search for its fourth coach since Bruce Arians left the team in 2017.

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