When a decade's worth of rebuilding efforts culminate into an 0-16 season, there's a good chance the coaching staff is going to become the "former coaching staff."
Just ask the Detroit Lions.
The NFL answer to something going so wrong on a grand scale? Blow it up. Start over. Like a bad round of Lemmings, click the mushroom cloud button and start again from square one.
Cleaning house like the Detroit Lions have done this offseason isn't fun for anyone. People lose their jobs, people have to move their families. Some members of the freshly anointed 0-16 team will likely never see NFL action again (I'm looking at you, Paris Lenon).
Still, sometimes it has to be done. This is one of those times, and unprecedentedly so.
Indeed, roughly half of the Lions roster has turned over from last season, and the number seems to increase by the day. Depending on how training camp battles turn out, the defense could see as many as nine new starters.
What you don't hear much about, however, is the coaching staff.
Everybody has heard about rookie head coach Jim Schwartz, super-veteran defensive coordinator and F-bomb enthusiast Gunther Cunningham, and the latest genius offensive coordinator/failed St. Louis Rams head coach to become the Lions' offensive coordinator (the second in three years), Scott Linehan.
But what about the rest of the coaching staff? The assistants, positional coaches, and quality control guys? Schwartz is certainly the most high-profile rookie on the Lions' coaching staff this year, but that doesn't make him the only one taking a big career step.
To put it into numbers, the Lions list 15 coaches between the offense and defense, including the head coach. Twelve of them are heading into their first year with the Lions, six have less than five years of NFL coaching experience, and most of them are coming off major promotions.
Not including special teams and strength and conditioning, both of which are fully intact from last season, the only holdovers from the previous regime are running backs coach Sam Gash, wide receivers coach Shawn Jefferson, and defensive assistant Don Clemons, who has been with the Lions since 1985.
New linebackers coach Matt Burke followed Schwartz from Tennessee after five years as a defensive assistant/quality control coach. This season will be his first as a positional coach in the NFL, though he was an assistant secondary coach at Harvard and was responsible for some on-field work with the linebackers at Tennessee.
Burke will have his hands full with the Lions' linebackers, but not in the way he might have three months ago.
The additions of Pro Bowler Julian Peterson, Steelers cap casualty Larry Foote, and third-round draftee DeAndre Levy have combined with existing playmaker Ernie Sims and changed Burke's question from "how are we going to compensate for a lack of talent" to "how are we going to use all this talent?"
Because of the talent at his disposal this year (far more across the board than any other Lions positional coach) and the impact the linebackers could have on Detroit's defense next year, Burke will have more of a microscope on him than many of his colleagues.
It will be primarily his job to see that Sims plays better with his instincts outside the Tampa Two, Foote makes a successful transition to the 4-3 defense, Levy makes solid progression as a rookie, and Peterson keeps doing his thing.
Secondary coach Tim Walton is another first-year guy, but not quite in the same way.
This will be Walton's first season in the NFL, but he is not at all new to the defensive secondary; he has been a secondary coach in the college ranks since 1999.
After three years as the running backs coach with Bowling Green, he was moved to defensive backs coach for the 1999 season. Over the next nine seasons, he coached secondary for Memphis, Syracuse, LSU, and Miami (Florida).
Though Walton's tendency to switch jobs every couple of years may be a turn-off, his results are hard to argue with. He won a national title with LSU in 2003, and his pass defense with Miami was ranked first in the nation in 2005, leading him to be promoted to defensive coordinator in 2007.
This season, Walton will get the chance to show his stuff in the pro game, and with a completely rebuilt cornerback corps and hard hitting second-round safety Louis Delmas in his arsenal, he will have a high-profile job his first year in the pros.
New tight ends coach Tim Lappano would normally not be noticed by much of anybody outside the Lions' Allen Park training facility. Tight end, while important, is not a position that usually faces intense criticism.
We're going to send you the most entertaining Detroit Lions articles, videos, and podcasts from around the web.
8 Comments
Loading more comments...
This comment and all replies have been deleted This comment has been deleted Undo delete