Detroit Lions: Matt Patricia is already cleaning house
Though he’s not officially hired yet, Matt Patricia is already cleaning house on the defensive side of the ball for the Detroit Lions.
You know it. I know it. Bob Quinn knows it. It’s just about as official as anyone can get in the week leading up to the Super Bowl. Matt Patricia is going to be the Detroit Lions’ head coach next season.
Unfortunately for the Lions, they must wait until Patricia’s season is over before they can make the announcement official. Patricia is still the coordinator of the New England Patriots, who play next week against the Philadelphia Eagles in the Super Bowl. In spite of the legality of not being a Lion yet, Patricia is cleaning house on one side of the ball at his future home.
It’s evident that Patricia is man, since most of the other jobs in the NFL have filled. The New York Giants—rumored by some to be Patricia’s favored destination—have already hired former Minnesota Vikings offensive coordinator Pat Shurmur. That moved was announced shortly after the Vikings were eliminated from the playoffs.
In spite of being without a head coach, though, the Lions have already started re-arranging and moving their staff around over this past week. The only current (er, former) Lions coach to have a Pro Bowler was defensive backs/corners coach Tony Oden.
In spite of his success, helping groom Slay into one of the league’s top shut-down corners, Oden was told that he is out of a job just this week. Word is that Patricia is making these phone calls himself, even though he is still under the Patriots employ for a few more days.
This firing comes on the heels of linebackers coach Bill Sheridan and another defensive backs coach, Alan Williams earlier in the week.
Couple that with the Cincinnati Bengals hiring Teryl Austin as their defensive coordinator, and Kris Kocurek moving on to the Miami Dolphins in a similar role, and the Detroit Lions are looking at an entirely new coaching staff on the defensive side of the ball.
On the other side of the coin, the offensive coaching staff seems to be remaining stable. No word on if offensive coordinator Jim Bob Cooter will be hitting the open market soon. And most of his position coaches are still in place. In fact, only former offensive line coach Ron Prince has been asked to pack up his office from the offensive side of the ball.
All of these moves paint a bigger picture: we have an incoming coach who has a certain design in mind for the defensive side of the ball. It further points to a guy who respects the job that Jim Bob Cooter has done the past few years in working with quarterback Matthew Stafford.
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Though the hiring is not yet official in the NFL, it’s pretty clear that Matt Patricia is the guy in Detroit. It’s also clear that he will come in with a plan for his defense.