Green Bay Packers Announce Coaching Staff Shakeup

In an effort to shake things up, the Green Bay Packers rearranged their coaching staff Thursday as they hired two new coaches and reassigned five others.

According to Packers.com, head coach Mike McCarthy brought in former San Francisco 49ers offensive line coach Mike Solari to be assistant offensive line coach. He also hired former University of Oklahoma defensive line coach Jerry Montgomery to the position of defensive front assistant.

In addition to that, Tom Clements was named associate head coach/offense, Edgar Bennett moved into the vacated offensive coordinator spot, Alex Van Pelt becomes quarterback/wide receivers coach, Ron Zook assumes the special teams coordinator role and Jason Simmons will be the assistant special teams coach.

According to the Packers' official Twitter account, Clements will be the new play-caller:

McCarthy served in that role since becoming head coach in 2006, but he believes it is a logical move in terms of allowing him to be more involved with all three phases of the game:

The head coach is also confident that the transition to Clements as a play-caller will be seamless:

A big reason for that is the fact that Clements has an accomplished track record as a play-caller already:

At the same time, McCarthy made it clear that he still has play-calling authority if he feels as though a certain situation warrants it, per Paul Imig of FoxSports.com:

Ultimately, McCarthy believes that restructuring the coaching staff is something that will aid the Packers in their pursuit of another championship:

McCarthy also seems excited about Van Pelt's unique role as the coach for both the quarterbacks and receivers, according to Imig:

A particular area of emphasis in this shakeup is special teams. While Zook and Simmons will work closely with the unit, McCarthy stressed the importance of his involvement as well, per Marques Eversoll of The Fan 1075:

Green Bay's inability to recover an onside kick in the NFC Championship Game against the Seattle Seahawks cost it a trip to Super Bowl XLIX. According to ESPN.com's Rob Demovsky, McCarthy wants better production out of that phase:

The Packers' sweeping changes are interesting since they came agonizingly close to playing for the Vince Lombardi Trophy this past season. If nothing else, these moves will keep things from getting stale.

Green Bay is talented enough from a personnel perspective to contend for a title in 2015, and now McCarthy believes it has a coaching staff to match.

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