New York Jets hire Robert Saleh as head coach

Former Seattle Seahawks assistant Robert Saleh became a star defensive coordinator for the San Francisco 49ers, and now he gets to be a head coach.

The New York Jets are hiring Saleh to replace Adam Gase following a rotten 2-14 season and 10th consecutive year without a postseason berth.

Saleh was the Seahawks’ Defensive quality control coach from 2011-2013 before joining the Jacksonville Jaguars as linebackers coach. He was brought on by Kyle Shanahan to be San Francisco’s defensive coordinator in 2017, and things did not get off to a smooth start. The 49ers were one of the worst defenses in the NFL in each of his first two seasons, but 2019 saw a gigantic leap to 2nd in DVOA and talent everywhere from the defensive line to the secondary. Even with the massive slate of injuries to the Niners defense in 2020, they still ranked 6th in DVOA.

With Saleh’s hire is also the report that he’ll be bringing passing game coordinator Mike LaFleur with him to be his first offensive coordinator. We’ll see just how much of Kyle Shanahan’s staff ends up landing jobs on other teams.

It is expected that Saleh’s replacement in San Francisco will be linebackers coach DeMeco Ryans, who’s certainly done a superb job coaching that group considering the performances of Fred Warner and Dre Greenlaw.