Hogs Haven
For years here on Hogs Haven, members have bemoaned the fact that certain coaches — Sean McVay & Kevin O’Connell in particular — were allowed to leave Washington only to see them go on to success as head coaches (or in the case of KOC, coordinator and head coach) for other teams. “Why,” many Hogs Haven members have lamented, “can’t we hold onto guys like McVay and O’Connell when we have them?”
This sort of misses the point that both of these guys underwent career development in Washington that led, ultimately, to their future success. It is, in fact, uncommon for NFL teams to ultimately benefit from this kind of talent development, as most successful coordinators are forced by necessity to change teams to get a head coaching opportunity. That’s what happened with McVay, and what would have happened eventually with O’Connell if he’d continued his successful tenure in Washington beyond 2019.
Of course, McVay was an offensive coordinator under Jay Gruden who got hired by the Rams as the youngest head coach in the league at 30 years of age in 2017. The opportunity for the Redskins to keep McVay any longer than they did (he spent 7 years in Washington under 2 head coaches as offensive assistant, tight ends coach and offensive coordinator) was close to zero. He is a Washington success story because he is an LA Rams success story.
Kevin O’Connell was on a similar and slightly faster coaching career trajectory to that of McVay when Ron Rivera replaced Jay Gruden as head coach in 2020. KOC had been with the Commanders for 3 years, progressing from QB coach to passing game coordinator and then, in 2019, to offensive coordinator. When Rivera arrived in 2020, he interviewed KOC, thanked him for his service, and hired Scot(t) Turner to replace him. O’Connell went to LA to spend two more seasons as offensive coordinator under McVay before getting hired as the head coach of the Vikings in 2022. Even if Rivera had kept KOC on as OC in Washington, had O’Connell been successful, he’d have eventually gotten a head coaching gig and left Washington. Of course, if he had been retained by Rivera and not been successful, he’d have left under different circumstances and we’d have one less successful former Washington coach to lament having lost.
That’s how NFL head coaching jobs work. Successful coordinators rarely get the chance for promotion to head coach because their success, almost by definition, usually occurs in an environment of stability under a successful head coach. It’s nearly impossible to develop good coaches like McVay and O’Connell and keep them beyond the position of coordinator because, if they sustain success, they will get hired by another team as a head coach.
The good news
The Washington Commanders clearly feel as if they have the next Sean McVay or Kevin O’Connell on the coaching staff right now.
On Friday, Ian Rappaport and others reported that Washington...
