Jaguars hire Buccaneers offensive coordinator Liam Coen as new head coach

With Baalke out of the image, it appears Coen regained curiosity within the opening. Jacksonville’s fascination with Coen was actually comprehensible. Coen directed the Buccaneers to a top-four end in whole yards, passing yards and speeding yards per sport in his first season as Tampa Bay’s play-caller, serving to Baker Mayfield reset his career-high marks in passing yards (4,500) and passing touchdowns (41) alongside the best way.

Maybe much more outstanding was the revival of Tampa Bay’s speeding assault, which completed useless final in yards per sport in 2023 and loved an unbelievable turnaround in 2024, driving a three-man backfield headlined by rookie Bucky Irving to a fourth-place end in speeding yards per sport in 2024.

Though they’re coached by a defensive-minded particular person in Bowles, the Buccaneers grew to become an offensive crew in 2024 due to Coen’s potential to extract probably the most from his gamers.

Irving’s success (207 carries, 1,122 yards, eight speeding touchdowns) propelled him to the highest of the depth chart within the second half of the season whereas returning again Rachaad White and beforehand unheralded bruiser Sean Tucker mixed to chip in one other 921 yards and 5 touchdowns. Mayfield even discovered success by means of the air with out his prime two targets — Mike Evans and Chris Godwin — leaning on the likes of tight finish Cade Otton and budding star rookie Jalen McMillan to maintain their offensive machine firing. As soon as Evans returned, he teamed up with Mayfield to steer the Buccaneers to a different NFC South title, clearing the 1,000-yard receiving mark on the ultimate play of the common season.

Coen comes from the Sean McVay teaching tree, having hung out beneath McVay in Los Angeles earlier than bouncing between the Rams and the College of Kentucky for a number of seasons. When Dave Canales left Tampa to take the Panthers’ prime job in 2024, the Buccaneers turned to Coen to orchestrate the offense and loved the fruits of his labor all through 2024, watching Mayfield surpass his personal ceiling beforehand set beneath Canales.

These fast outcomes had been sturdy sufficient to persuade the Jaguars that Coen was who they wanted to pair with quarterback Trevor Lawrence in an effort to get the previous No. 1 decide again on observe, and thus, your entire Jaguars franchise. Jacksonville has been reeling since its second-half collapse to finish the 2023 season, lacking the playoffs in spectacular style and watching these adverse outcomes spill over right into a 4-13 end in 2024.

These outcomes left proprietor Shad Khan dissatisfied sufficient to fireside Pederson, initially backing Baalke earlier than reversing course and firing the GM in what now appears to have been an try to land Coen. Ultimately, it labored out for Khan’s membership, which now should rent a common supervisor able to working in tandem with Coen to form the Jaguars’ future in his imaginative and prescient.

After signing Lawrence to an extension final offseason, that imaginative and prescient will embody the Clemson product. The remainder stays to be decided for the Jaguars, who will try to duplicate the Buccaneers’ success beneath the route of their meteoric play-caller.