Defensive Coordinator Candidates

[Favre>Rodgers259]

The Cardinals were 10th this year weren't they?

Correction - Different sites have them ranked between 10th and 13th.

 

[Dantés]

Could you watch all of their interviews and give me an analysis of their personalities?

I don’t want a nice guy. I want an alpha dog who chews his players to shreds.

I watched Borgonzi and he had this little smirk that totally said "Yeah, I know I'm good. Not the best, but good enough. But I'm not cocky-- just confident. But not too confident." His words.

 

[Dantés]

The Cardinals were 10th this year weren't they?

Correction - Different sites have them ranked between 10th and 13th.

12th in scoring defense-- virtually identical to Pettine.

 

[Dantés]

To my mind, there are three basic tiers of coordinators (or head coaches who basically act as one unit's main coordinator).

Top: These guys consistently get more out of their talent than just the sum of the parts. Current examples include Vic Fangio, Bill Belichick, Ron Rivera, Wink Martindale, Mike Zimmer.

Middle: These guys basically give you back what you put into the defense. If you invest a lot, they can coach up a great unit. If your personnel is poor, so will they be. Most of the league's coordinators reside here. Current examples include Mike Pettine, John Pagano, Gus Bradley, Jack Del Rio, etc, etc.

Bottom: The other end of the bell curve, these guys somehow manage to give you back less than the sum of the talent they're given. In recent seasons, I would put guys like Matt Patricia, Paul Guenther, and Mike Nolan in this tier.

Most of the veteran coordinators out there seem to belong to the middle tier OR they're really old, to the point that it's unclear what they really have left.

Chances are that any young guy hired will fall into that middle tier as well, but those guys also have the potential of being top tier guys.

Given that this should be a coveted job, and allowing that the Packers vet candidates properly, I am not too concerned about them ending up with a guy from the bottom of the barrel.

 

[PackAttack12]

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[Favre>Rodgers259]

Why would he be interested in Joe Barry? He's horrible.

There's a lot of hype around Evero and I don't understand why. I'm not saying he's a bad choice I just don't know.

Chris Harris is a maybe.

I think LeFleur is practicing for the real candidates, he also knocks off the Rooney Rule at the same time.

 

[GleefulGary]

Why would he be interested in Joe Barry? He's horrible.

There's a lot of hype around Evero and I don't understand why. I'm not saying he's a bad choice I just don't know.

Chris Harris is a maybe.

I think LeFleur is practicing for the real candidates, he also knocks off the Rooney Rule at the same time.

Evero has been an understudy to two of the very best recent DC’s in recent NFL years, and his position group has been very good as well.

Why wouldn’t you interview him?!

 

[Dantés]

Chris Harris has worked under Gus Bradley and Ron Rivera. I'm not blown away by his resume, but you don't necessarily know where these guys are going to come from.

Joe Barry flopped as a DC in Washington. That said, go back and look at their defensive personnel in 2015-16. It's pretty brutal. Since that time, he's worked under Wade Philips and Brandon Staley. Maybe it's felt that he's developed since then. Or maybe LaFleur is just giving an interview to a guy he knows.

Evero is the guy I'm interested in. I'm glad they're interviewing him. I'd be pretty excited about that hire.

 

[Fredrik87]

Circling back on this-- thanks for bringing him up.

I had not know anything about him previously, but he is a pretty attractive candidate. Jumping from Safeties Coach to DC would be a big jump, but we've seen recently in the league that if a guy's got it, they can make that guy of transition work.

I will say that if you think about what the Rams have done at safety since Evero has been there, he's clearly doing good work. He helped Lamarcus Joyner transition to the position and thrive. He helped John Johnson develop into a really good player. He helped Taylor Rapp work around his deficiencies to become a strong starter. And he got good play out of Jordan Fuller, a really athletically limited rookie.

I guess the only thing to give you pause is that the Rams could have promoted him to the job when Staley left, and instead hired Raheem Morris.

But he's a name to monitor for sure.

so circling back yet again we have now apparently interviewed or are about to interview Evero.

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[Favre>Rodgers259]

Joe Barry flopped as a DC in Washington. That said, go back and look at their defensive personnel in 2015-16. It's pretty brutal. Since that time, he's worked under Wade Philips and Brandon Staley. Maybe it's felt that he's developed since then. Or maybe LaFleur is just giving an interview to a guy he knows.

Evero is the guy I'm interested in. I'm glad they're interviewing him. I'd be pretty excited about that hire.

Barry flopped as a DC in Detroit too. Notable players: Shaun Rogers, Shaun Cody, Kalimba Edwards, Boss Bailey, Ernie Sims, Kenoy Kennedy, and Idrees Bashir....they were serviceable.

I get that Evero seems to have a lot momentum coaching under McVay; we all know McVay coaches are the "hot thing" now in the NFL. I also admit that I don't know much about him but he's still relatively early into his career. He would be the "high upside guy" to me. I watched an interview of him and he seems smart and relatable, that much I do like. I just am curious what we're going to get out of him from a philosophy and scheme standpoint.

 

[Dantés]

Barry flopped as a DC in Detroit too. Notable players: Shaun Rogers, Shaun Cody, Kalimba Edwards, Boss Bailey, Ernie Sims, Kenoy Kennedy, and Idrees Bashir....they were serviceable.

I get that Evero seems to have a lot momentum coaching under McVay; we all know McVay coaches are the "hot thing" now in the NFL. I also admit that I don't know much about him but he's still relatively early into his career. He would be the "high upside guy" to me. I watched an interview of him and he seems smart and relatable, that much I do like. I just am curious what we're going to get out of him from a philosophy and scheme standpoint.

I don't think that anyone has even mentioned McVay.

 

[GleefulGary]

I don't think that anyone has even mentioned McVay.

Sean McVay. There. Mentioned him.

 

[Dantés]

Sean McVay. There. Mentioned him.

Alright, @Favre>Rodgers259 go get him.

 

[GleefulGary]

If you were to tell me that there was a guy out there who had seen his position group excel with multiple different players for the past 4 years, had learned from Vic Fangio, Wade Phillips, and Brandon Staley, I would probably say you couldn’t do much better as far as an up and comer.

That is a tremendous resume. Have no idea how he’ll interview or how he would run his own defense, but from the outside, Ejiro looks very good to me.

 

[GleefulGary]

I could give two rips that he was coaching under McVay btw. This isn’t an offensive hire.

 

[PackAttack12]

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Didn’t want to start a new thread for this, but passing along.

 

[Dantés]

Kris Richard is getting an interview.

 

[mradtke66]

Kris Richard is getting an interview.

I will say I'm not a huge fan of Cover-3 schemes. Seems like the most recent version of "haver a super simple scheme and super-amazing players" kind of defense.

See all also the Jimmy Johnson Man-2 (and descendants) and the Tampa-2.

 

[Dantés]

I will say I'm not a huge fan of Cover-3 schemes. Seems like the most recent version of "haver a super simple scheme and super-amazing players" kind of defense.

See all also the Jimmy Johnson Man-2 (and descendants) and the Tampa-2.

Yeah, I think that pretty well sums it up.

The version of the defense that Carroll was running to great success when Richard was there was amazing... when you had Richard Sherman, Earl Thomas, Kam Chancellor, K.J. Wright, Bobby Wagner, and a strong pass rush.

What we saw out of the Seahawks in 2020, especially in the first half of the season, was what happens when you run that system without great pieces.

Any time a particular system has a ton of success in the NFL, it's mimicked all over the place. Over time, the league catches up to how to crack it. At that point, only the really innovative guys in that particular tree can keep pushing and evolving and being successful. The pretenders get exposed.

Maybe Richard is one of those special innovators. I have no idea.

 

[Dantés]

Albert Breer mentioned that Jim Leonhard interviewed for the Rams DC job last year. So he must have interest in the NFL.

I would definitely be good with that hire. The Badger fans around this place would be laughing and crying at the same time.

 

[GreenNGold_81]

Albert Breer mentioned that Jim Leonhard interviewed for the Rams DC job last year. So he must have interest in the NFL.

I would definitely be good with that hire. The Badger fans around this place would be laughing and crying at the same time.

Wouldn't that be risky? This is a win-now team, a coach without experience coaching in the NFL would be a little risky IMO.

 

[tynimiller]

Wouldn't that be risky? This is a win-now team, a coach without experience coaching in the NFL would be a little risky IMO.

NO kidding...just like MLF had none before we hired him. Dear Lord, cannot we not do that again....

 

[Dantés]

Wouldn't that be risky? This is a win-now team, a coach without experience coaching in the NFL would be a little risky IMO.

I don't see much difference in risk between:

-Hiring a talented position coach who has never been a DC.

-Hiring a former DC who has failed or is on his way out.

-Hiring a good, proven DC from a high end college program.

Just my opinion.

 

[Deleted member 6794]

NO kidding...just like MLF had none before we hired him. Dear Lord, cannot we not do that again....

MLF had worked in different roles in the NFL for 10 seasons before being hired by the Packers. Leonhard doesn't have any experience as a coach at the pro level.

 

[easyk83]

MLF had worked in different roles in the NFL for 10 seasons before being hired by the Packers. Leonhard doesn't have any experience as a coach at the pro level.

Leonhard played in the league for 10 years, with multiple franchises and worked with multiple NFL coaches some of who were very good. He also had a reputation for being an on field coach and a well regarded leader towards the end of his career.