Sean McVay has only been an NFL head coach for four seasons, but he’s already helped three of his assistants land head-coaching jobs elsewhere in that brief period of time. But beyond Matt LaFleur, Zac Taylor and Brandon Staley, McVay has seen a number of coordinators and position coaches leave for better opportunities with other teams.
This offseason alone, Aubrey Pleasant, Joe Barry, Shane Waldron and Andy Dickerson earned promotions around the NFL – in addition to Staley becoming head coach of the Chargers, of course. But McVay doesn’t see the constant turnover on his staff as a bad thing.
“We’ve had a lot of turnover for all the right reasons,” McVay told the Wall Street Journal. “Those are positive problems if you’re having guys leave for better opportunities.”
The departures stretch to the front office, too. General manager Les Snead lost a pair of key personnel evaluators this offseason with Brad Holmes being hired as the Lions’ new general manager and Ray Agnew joining him as Detroit’s assistant GM.
The Rams didn’t hire any outside candidates to fill those roles, instead continuing to promote from within by elevating members of the front office. Snead sees the Rams as a team that develops talent across the board, comparing it to a teaching hospital.
“I’ve said to our group, ‘We’ve got to be a teaching hospital, where future bright young doctors want to get a rotation spot,’” Snead said. “You’ve got to train people to step up.”
Next offseason, it’ll probably be much of the same. On the Rams’ coaching staff, Eric Henderson, Kevin O’Connell, Thomas Brown, Raheem Morris and Ejiro Evero could get looks as potential head-coaching candidates in 2022.
McVay can block them from making lateral moves that don’t involve a title promotion, but if they want to make the jump from position coach to coordinator or head coach, there’s nothing he can do – and he’ll be happy to see them progress their careers.
