A day after Brian Belichick departed, Mike Vrabel is hiring a veteran safeties coach who worked with him in Tennessee
The Patriots struck gold with Mike Vrabel, who tops the ranking of NFL head coaching hires, while the Cowboys fell short with Brian Schottenheimer.
The New England Patriots replaced one former linebacker with another as their head coach. After just one year under player-turned-coach Jerod Mayo, New England opted to hire former Patriots legend Mike Vrabel as their head coach.
For some of those teams, that will involve finding new head coaches and/or General Managers. Three teams fired their head coaches during the season and two more have been dispatched as of 9 a.m. ET on January 6.
The Patriots needed to ensure they made the right choice to be their next head coach, and it looks like Mike Vrabel was the right one.
The New York Jets and Aaron Glenn have agreed to terms on making the Detroit Lions defensive coordinator their head coach
Vrabel has a mix of experience and youth on his Patriots coaching staff, including Doug Marrone, Thomas Brown and Ashton Grant on offense.
Speaking on his podcast with Julian Edelman, Rob Gronkowski relayed a time where Mike Vrabel "outplayed" Bill Belichick as head coach.
Last season, the Patriots staff had first-timers at head coach (Mayo), offensive play caller (Alex Van Pelt), defensive coordinator/play caller (Covington), and offensive line coach (Scott Peters).
So far, besides the Patriots and Vrabel, Lions coordinators Ben Johnson (Bears) and Aaron Glenn (Jets) have been scooped up, while Bucs OC Liam Coen is heading to Jacksonville, Pete Carroll is reportedly returning to the sidelines with the Raiders and Brian Schottenheimer has been hired by the Cowboys.
With Johnson heading to Chicago and Mike Vrabel already in New England, five head coaching vacancies remain. The Jets, Saints, Jaguars, Raiders and Cowboys are still in the hunt. Johnson, who was Detroit’s offensive coordinator, agreed to become the Chicago Bears head coach on Monday, two days after the No. 1 seeded Lions lost to Washington.