what do Tom Landry, Paul Brown and Don Shula...

Almost ALL coaches will get fired eventually.

Did Shula get fired? I think he actually "retired" but wasn't officially fired by Wayne Huizenga.

You make a good point, chief ("it's not easy.")

Some times they don't outright fire you, but they make it so the position is untenable for you.
Shula wasn't fired but knew it was time to go. Bowden got out of West Virginia just in time. The Bear couldn't co-exist with the president at Maryland or Adolph Rupp at Kentucky. Even Walsh and the DeBartolos were on the outs at the end of his tenure with the 49ers.

I guess the Ole Ball Coach has been lucky so far. But if he'd have stayed at Duke, or with the Redskins...?

It's like Bud Wilkinson once said, "It doesn't matter what you've done, or how good a guy you are. After awhile, they just want somebody else." He called it his "Eight-year Rule," as in good coaches get fired (let go, pushed out, promoted, retire) after eight years.

I think he lost almost twice as many games as he won in the two years he was the head coach in Washington.

Thing I remember about Spurrier at Washington was the way Patrick Ramsey was treated. I thought Ramsey would do well under a great QB coach like Spurrier, but I think the opposite happened. Spurrier had a couple of UF guys at Washington (Danny Wuerffel and Shane Matthews , IIRC) and Ramsey never really got a fair shake.

I think what happened is that Spurrier just didn't realize how much work the NFL really is. He had a great thing going at UF...had dedicated assistants, alumni that worshipped him, and a pipeline to a steady supply of some of the best high school players in the country. He just didn't realize how different the NFL is from college.