As Sean Payton puts together his first coaching staff in Denver, it’s likely to skew toward people he’s familiar with.
This is no big shock given both his long history and deep NFL rolodex and also coaches’ general preference for working with people they already know and trust.
Payton, who as of Monday morning has not finalized any of his three coordinator positions, outlined during Super Bowl week in Arizona why he follows the mantra, “slow to hire, fast to fire,” and what he’s aiming for as he builds a staff.
“I think passion, teachers, people that are obsessed with winning,” he said on the Up & Adams Show, noting that he thinks good coaches are available to hire even through the NFL Combine, which begins in two weeks. “I think that’s most important. Look with any staff, there’s going to be a handful you’ve worked with and a handful that you haven’t.”
The lone confirmed member of the staff so far is offensive line coach Zach Strief, whom Payton acknowledged is coming to Denver during an interview last week.
Strief spent the past two years as New Orleans’ assistant offensive line coach. He was originally a seventh-round draft pick of Payton’s who ended up playing 12 years. Payton told reporters in Arizona of how he first learned of Strief by talking to then-Northwestern coach Randy Walker, whom Payton coached for at Miami (Ohio) in the mid-1990s.
Then Strief worked his way from role player to starter, won a Super Bowl with the Saints and dabbled in broadcasting before joining Payton’s coaching staff.
“The point I’m making is, man, he’s special,” Payton said after outlining Strief’s path. “Cincinnati, Ohio (native), Northwestern. I love him because I know him well as a player and as a coach. … It’s not announced yet, but he is going to be coming with us and I feel like it’s only right because I found him.”
How the rest of the staff comes together remains to be seen, but Payton figures to make progress on that front over the course of the week. In addition to his television work for FOX and several interviews during his time in Arizona, Payton said he was completing several virtual interviews for staff positions per day.
He put in a request to interview Saints quarterbacks coach Ronald Curry for the offensive coordinator position and has talked with at least Seattle assistant Sean Desai and, according to FOX, Rex Ryan for defensive coordinator. The likelihood is he’s talked to several more candidates than that and will have had to before he makes a hire. The expanded Rooney Rules require at least two external, minority or female candidate interviews for coordinator positions and at least one for the quarterbacks coach.
Meanwhile, the list of coaches leaving the franchise from the 2022 staff also continued to grow over the weekend with senior defensive assistant Dom Capers, according to NFL Network, joining Ejiro Evero’s defensive staff in Carolina. New Texans head coach DeMeco Ryans, according to long-time Houston reporter John McClain, is working on hiring Broncos quarterbacks coach and passing game coordinator Klint Kubiak to a similar position. The list of outbound coaches also includes offensive line coach Butch Barry and special teams coordinator Dwayne Stukes (each fired in December), Evero, strength coach Loren Landow, linebackers coaches Peter Hansen and Bert Watts, assistant defensive backs coach Ola Adams, running backs coach Tyrone Wheatley, tight ends coach Jake Moreland, and assistant offensive line coach Ben Steele.
Others, like offensive coordinator Justin Outten, wide receivers coach Zach Azzanni, defensive backs coach Christian Parker and defensive line coach Marcus Dixon, remain under contract and are in a holding pattern.
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