College football teams fire coaches way too rapidly, which leads to other coaches leaving their jobs early, which leads to those jobs needing to hire anew, and so on.

Since that trend’s probably not gonna change any time soon, it’s time to start thinking ahead as to which of 2018’s 20 new FBS head coaches will actually stick around for a while. (Idea borrowed from Podcast Ain’t Played Nobody.)

1. Your new coach will probably be gone within the next five full seasons.

Based on the previous seven fully completed five-year cycles, only a third of new hires actually make it through five whole seasons at the same school — and that’s even counting a few coaches who were fired or left immediately after those fifth seasons, like Dave Clawson staying through five full years at Bowling Green before leaving for Wake Forest.

Most head coaches get fired before completing five years, with some of them completing four and then getting fired partially through Year 5.

In the average coaching cycle, roughly the same number of coaches will either stick around for five full years or leave early (whether for another job, willful retirement, health reasons, or another reason other than termination).

2. Plenty of coaches won’t last anywhere near five full years.

For example, Butch Jones had two different three-year runs in this time period before he nearly reached five at Tennessee. And yes, I counted both of Pitt’s new head coach hires after the 2010 season as being fired (Mike Haywood) and leaving early (Todd Graham).

3. So! Who’s gonna make it this time?

Unless we have an outlier crop, we have to divide these 20 new coaches up roughly into thirds. Let’s make some guesses.

Fired before five full years

Nothing personal. Gotta pick at least seven names! Most of these simply boil down to these being verified hard jobs.

Mike Bloomgren, Rice (In addition to all the usual stuff, the Owls’ upcoming non-con schedules are really hard.) Steve Campbell, South Alabama Dana Dimel, UTEP (Already 30-39 as a head coach, including a stint at the far less challenging Houston.) Herm Edwards, Arizona State (This would probably require an athletic director change first, I guess.) Matt Luke, Ole Miss (Not counting 2017’s interim year. Because of NCAA sanctions, the Rebel legacy player deserves more patience than most new hires, but the SEC West is hard.) Chad Lunsford, Georgia Southern Jeremy Pruitt, Tennessee (The Vols have failed to reach expectations despite a previously experienced head coach, top recruiting, and a bad SEC East. The SEC East is probably no longer bad.)

Leaving before five full years

Most of these coaches have pretty clear geographic ties elsewhere.

Mario Cristobal, Oregon (The Ducks again have a coach with Florida ties. Great for recruiting, but not ideal if a top Sunshine State job opens. What if Mark Richt retires at age 60 or so?) Josh Heupel, UCF (This offense sets up to keep scoring a ton of points. Future Big 12 HC job for the former Oklahoma QB?) Sean Lewis, Kent State (The last guy got five years despite going 14-45. Hard to get fired from such a bleak job, but you should also get out ASAP.) Joe Moorhead, Mississippi State (Second MSU coach in a row with lots of Northeast ties.) Chad Morris, Arkansas (If he only treads water, he’ll still be mentioned for every Power 5 opening in Texas.) Billy Napier, UL-Lafayette

Still around after five full years!

Near certainty: At least one of these coaches will be fired!

Sonny Dykes, SMU Jimbo Fisher, Texas A&M (He’d still have a $35 million buyout at that point, but never put anything past the Aggies.) Scott Frost, Nebraska Chip Kelly, UCLA (Where’s he gonna go? He already chose UCLA over a top SEC job, and the NFL’s probably given up on him.) Dan Mullen, Florida Jonathan Smith, Oregon State (Say the native son makes a bowl every other year. That’s doable at OSU.) Willie Taggart, Florida State (Oregon fans will go all LOL JOB-HOPPER SLICK WILLIE, but this is his actual dream job, not just the one he called his dream job in the intro presser.)

4. One thing: Will the Early Signing Period change this math?

We still don’t know a lot about how typical long-term planning changed as a result of the new December Signing Period. But there’s even more of an argument than ever for letting a 50/50 coach stick around another year, since a firing three weeks before the ESP could spoil a recruiting class. (That also means a hot-seat coach who stays will be gone even earlier in the following season, to try and get a new head coach installed well before mid-December.)

That’s also just based on one year of evidence, though. We don’t really know whether the far majority of players will sign in December every year or more players will wait until February next time, after seeing how the whole process shakes out in this inaugural year.

It’d be nice if schools pumped the brakes in general, especially as ridiculous buyouts continue to bloom, but lots of things would be nice.