Steve Wilks Named New Cardinals Head Coach

Darren Urban

http://www.azcardinals.com/news-and-events/article-2/Steve-Wilks-Named-New-Cardinals-Head-Coach/a3f82f62-e738-4cdc-81b5-8a6474136ddc

Team gives Panthers defensive coordinator four-year contract

New Cardinals head coach Steve Wilks talks Monday after signing his contract to succeed Bruce Arians as head coach.

As they did last time they had a vacancy, the Cardinals were the final team to find a head coach this January.
They are counting on the hire of Steve Wilks to create the same kind of success that came with Bruce Arians.
The Cards named Wilks, the Panthers defensive coordinator, their new head coach on Monday after Arians retired earlier this month. Wilks, 48, signed a four-year contract with a team option for a fifth season.
A press conference officially introducing Wilks will be Tuesday at noon Arizona time.
“This is not really a rebuild, this is a retool,” Wilks told azcardinals.com. “We have the culture of winning here. We just have to be able to sustain it. It’s all about trying to get to the next level and the consistency you need to get to the next level.
“I believe building a culture based on three things: Trust, commitment and accountability.”
Under Wilks’ leadership, the Panthers’ defense was seventh in total defense, 11th in points allowed, third in rush defense and third in sacks.
Pro Bowl cornerback Patrick Peterson, upon seeing the news leak out, tweeted out an emphatic message in all capital letters: “I LOVE IT.”
Wilks has been coaching since 1995 and has been an NFL assistant since 2006. The Panthers hired Wilks in 2012 as defensive backs coach, adding assistant head coach to his title in 2014. Wilks was promoted to defensive coordinator in 2017, along with his assistant head coach role. He has also coached with the Bears and Chargers. He has coached in two Super Bowls, one each with the Bears and Panthers.
“In our research, they talked about what a passionate coach (Wilks) is on the field and what a terrific leader he is,” team president Michael Bidwill said. “Players love playing for him.”
Technically, the Cards won’t be considered last in the coaching carousel, since the Lions (with Patriots defensive coordinator Matt Patricia) and Colts (with Patriots offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels) are still officially waiting to make their announcements. The Giants also hired Pat Shurmur Monday, although technically after Wilks was announced.
From the start, Bidwill emphasized the Cardinals were not in a “race” to fill their spot and were going to take their time to get the right man.
Panthers head coach Ron Rivera already knew at the end of the season Wilks could get a head coaching job. Wilks also interviewed with the Giants and Titans, and was among those interviewed for the Rams’ vacancy last season.
“I know that Steve is a hot commodity, deservedly-so,” Rivera told Carolina reporters. “He has done a tremendous job wherever he’s been, starting in Chicago and San Diego and down here with us. It’s going to be a tough one. Him and (Bills coach and former Carolina DC) Sean (McDermott) are two very good people who are very special to this organization. We helped build this team.
“I don’t want to talk as if Steve is gone, but I have a hunch. It might be his time.”
There had been reports that the Cards might still have second interviews with Patriots linebackers coach Brian Flores and Eagles quarterbacks coach John DeFilippo, but those did not come to fruition after Wilks’ strong second interview Friday with Bidwill and General Manager Steve Keim.
“I understand it’s a privilege,” Wilks said. “I’m humbled and honored to be the head coach.”

Courtney Cronin
ESPN Staff Writer

Philadelphia’s run-pass option dismantled teams throughout the 2017 season. It was no different for the Vikings defense in the NFC Championship. Defensive tackle Tom Johnson said they were anticipating Nick Foles would drop back further instead of stay in the middle of the pocket. Foles thrived off the use of play-action passes, going 10-for-11 for 105 yards and a touchdown on those throws Sunday night.

Agamemnon wrote:

What it does prove is that you played better football over 4 quarters than the other guy.

lol

I was in a debate recently on another board with guys who said that come from behind wins are not that great, they just prove you didn’t play well in the first 3 quarters.

13:37 to go in the 4th, 20-10 Jagz, and Jax recovers a fumble.

Rams in Good Position at Start of 2018 Offseason

Myles Simmons

http://www.therams.com/news-and-events/article-1/Rams-in-Good-Position-at-Start-of-2018-Offseason/4f4e40ab-1794-4208-a6b5-50727ea616d2

About a year ago at this time, Los Angeles’ new head coach Sean McVay was busy assembling his coaching staff as general manager Les Snead prepared to go to the Senior Bowl to get a look at the upcoming draft class.

The coaching staff and personnel staff hand’t had a chance to sit down and describe what traits they’re ideally looking for in each position — information that’s vital when putting together a roster.

hat process certainly took place in time — and clearly worked well enough for the Rams to win their first NFC West title since 2003.

But after the conclusion of the 2017 season, general manager Les Snead acknowledged the work of building the 2018 Rams has already begun, saying that in effect, it never stops.

“It’s interesting — you have a season going on but in personnel you are always preparing for whether it’s looming free agency, looming draft, and then any unforeseen injuries on that Saturday, Sunday or Monday,” Snead said. “So you almost have two worlds that are cohesive but different going on at the same time.”

Because of that, the Rams are in a position they clearly weren’t in last offseason. Snead and his staff won’t have to overhaul personnel groupings in ways that are usually associated with a change in coaching staff.

“Instead of last year, coming in and implementing a new offense, converting our defense to [coordinator Wade Phillips’] 3-4 — all of those things we don’t have to do. That’s been done,” Snead said. “So now I think it’s a nice part.”

Going through that process last year, Snead figured the Rams would show improvement — particularly offensively. But even he admitted that he wasn’t quite anticipating the jump Los Angeles would make in scoring points.

“I can even remember sitting with Sean a few times — and this is after we did the first minicamp when he was able to practice — and then we got through OTA’s and ‘OK, I think we’re going to improve on offense.’ And if we were 32nd in scoring , ‘Hey … I think we can at least be 20, 18,’” Snead said. “And I can remember some moments as we kept going down the process, Sean was looking at me almost like I was negative nelly, like, ‘What are you thinking?’ It was literally like, ‘There’s no way we’re just going to be 20.””

McVay was correct about that, as the Rams became just the second team in NFL history to go from last to first in scoring one year to the next. And it was through the process of emphasizing daily improvement and daily excellence — as McVay often stresses — that Snead says the season’s expectations began to change for everyone.

“By coming in every single day and working, at some point — guess what — we did expect to win the division,” Snead said. “And it wasn’t Day 1, but it was from a lot of work. And then all of a sudden, somewhere during that season, you went from working to, ‘Alright who are we going to be?’ To figuring out who you are going to be — ‘So, OK, this is who we are’ — and you expect to go finish the season. Can’t say when it was — there was no defining moment — but that’s kind of how I put the timeline into effect.”

And though the Rams’ postseason ended earlier than anyone would have liked with the loss to the Falcons, Snead channeled arguably the best coach in college football history to detail how Los Angeles will move forward.

“I think it’s a huge motivating factor,” Snead said. “Like I just said, and it’s from Nick Saban: Don’t waste the feeling.

“I don’t think you’ll ever get over it. You just cope with it, and then use it as fuel,” Snead continued. “The nice thing about it is, we got to a point where it was just, let’s go to work. Let’s try to figure out this thing. Let’s try to solve our problems.To, all of a sudden, we knew we could do it. We believed we could do it. We expected we could do it. That put us to this level. We’re division champions and we don’t have to get to that level now.”

link: http://www.profootballwriters.org/2018/01/19/chargers-allen-pfwa-comeback-player-year-rams-goff-improved-player-year/

Los Angeles Rams quarterback Jared Goff, who threw for 28 touchdowns, was selected as the 2017 NFL Most Improved Player of the Year

Top 5 Jared Goff Plays in 2017

Check out Los Angeles Rams QB Jared Goff’s best plays from the 2017 season.

http://www.therams.com/videos/videos/Top-5-Jared-Goff-Plays-in-2017/63e41bb4-851e-490c-ab35-ff67e4cc99e8

#LARams HC Sean McVay has been named Coach of the Year by @PFWAwriters.

Story here: https://t.co/9iMainDEcc

— Myles Simmons (@MylesASimmons) January 18, 2018

Marrone says camp practices highlighted the gap between Patriots, Jaguars

Phil Perry

http://www.nbcsports.com/boston/patriots/marrone-says-camp-practices-highlighted-gap-between-patriots-jaguars

FOXBORO — They just weren’t at the same level.

After a series of training camp practices between the Jaguars and Patriots, that was the takeaway new Jacksonville head coach Doug Marrone underscored. The Patriots were the Patriots. And the Jaguars . . . well, they had work to do.

“I viewed that as we really had a lot of work ahead of us,” Marrone said on a conference call Wednesday, just days before the teams met at Gillette Stadium once again for the AFC title game.

“I think that’s the one thing that I learned from practicing up there for those three days. How much stuff that we were behind on, and how much ground we needed to make up in a short period of time. Obviously we were all new, and I just thought that they were much further ahead than we were. I think it was good for me to point out to our players how much further we had to go. How long we had to go. And how much work we had to put in.”

Since then, with some help from Marrone’s hard coaching, the Jaguars went 10-6 to win the AFC South, and they recorded one of the best defensive seasons for any team in recent memory. They finished the year as the league’s top passing defense and its second-ranked defense in terms of points allowed, yards allowed and sacks.

The defensive talent in Jacksonville is top-tier, no doubt. And president Tom Coughlin seems to have made a sizable impact on the identity of the club. But Marrone, an old-school coach by all accounts, deserves some credit for helping his team embrace its punch-you-in-the-mouth mentality.

The question is, is it possible that Jaguars fans may have Bill Belichick to thank, in part, for the Jaguars landing Marrone in the first place? Earlier on Wednesday, The MMQB’s Albert Breer tweeted that Marrone received a “glowing recommendation” from Belichick when Marrone was being considered for his current gig.

Asked about his relationship with Belichick on Wednesday, and what a recommendation like that meant to him, Marrone was eager to throw praise Belichick’s way.

“I think if you’re a coach, I don’t care what level you’re at — you’re at high school, college, NFL — you look at the success of Coach Belichick, and I was always the type of guy that would try to learn as much as I can from people that’ve been successful, so that maybe I wouldn’t make a mistake, or maybe that person made a mistake while they were coming up.”

from Final NFL QB Rankings by PFF Player Grades, 2017

PFF

https://www.profootballfocus.com/news/final-nfl-qb-rankings-by-pff-player-grades-2017?utm_content=bufferd01c7&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=nfl

18. JARED GOFF, LOS ANGELES RAMS – 79.8 OVERALL GRADE

Excerpt from the PFF QB Annual: There is no hiding the giant leap forward taken by Jared Goff in his sophomore campaign under new head coach Sean McVay. Goff’s overall PFF grade improved from a disastrous 45.6 as a rookie to 79.8 this season, an increase of more than 30.0 points. His best games this season were excellent, and he manned the helm of one of the league’s best offenses, but there were still poor outings that he will hope to eradicate in 2018 and beyond.

Five Takeaways: 2017 L.A. Rams Season

Myles Simmons

http://www.therams.com/news-and-events/article-fivetakeaways/Five-Takeaways-2017-LA-Rams-Season/bcedf189-fb9f-48dc-ac2b-a63ebaec1b54

The Rams underwent a major transformation in 2017, winning the NFC West with an 11-5 record in the club’s first year under head coach Sean McVay.

While Los Angeles’ playoff run ended earlier than the team expected, as McVay said last week, “you also don’t want it to take away from a lot of the great things that our players and that our coaches were able to achieve.”

With that in mind, here are five takeaways from the Rams’ season.

1) From worst to first

The Rams’ offense went from paltry to prolific with a historic turnaround under the direction of McVay and his staff. Los Angeles became only the second team in NFL history to go from last to first in scoring from year to year, joining the 1965 49ers.

L.A. scored 478 points in 2017, more than doubling its output from 2016. At 29.9 points per game, the Rams scored 1.3 than the Patriots and Eagles, who tied for No. 2 at 28.6. Los Angeles finished No. 3 with 44.3 percent of its possessions ending in points, and No. 3 at scoring 2.26 points per drive.

What’s more, the Rams’ point output was the fourth most in franchise history, behind only the teams from the “Greatest Show on Turf” era from 1999-2001. The 2001 Rams scored 503 points, the 1999 team scored 526, and the 2000 club scored 540.

Given the scoring prowess, it’s no surprise Los Angeles finished within the top 10 in nearly all major offensive categories. The club ranked No. 10 in total yards, No. 10 in passing yards, and No. 8 in rushing yards.

Not bad for a team with a first-year head coach.

2) Starting fast on defense

The Rams’ defense may have finished the year No. 19 in yards allowed and No. 12 in points allowed, but the unit proved to excel at recording takeaways — particularly early in games.

Los Angeles ended eight of its opponents’ opening drives with a takeaway in 2017. It started with the first game of the season, when cornerback Trumaine Johnson intercepted Colts quarterback Scott Tolzien’s first pass of the season and returned it 39 yards for a touchdown.

The full list of the Rams’ opening-possession takeaways:

Week 1 vs Colts: Johnson 39-yard pick six
Week 3 at 49ers: CB Nickell Robey-Coleman interception
Week 9 at Giants: DT Aaron Donald sack/fumble, OLB Connor Barwin recovery
Week 10 vs. Texans: Donald sack/fumble, OLB Matt Longacre recovery
Week 13 at Cardinals: S Lamarcus Joyner interception
Week 14 vs. Eagles: CB Kayvon Webster interception
Week 15 at Seahawks: Joyner forced fumble, LB Alec Ogletree recovery
Week 16 at Titans: LB Cory Littleton interception

In all, the team finished No. 5 with 28 takeaways and No. 2 with 126 points off takeaways.

3) Special teams excels, too

The Rams had three specialists not only named to the Pro Bowl. but also named as AP All-Pros.

Despite playing only 14 games due to a back injury suffered last in the season, kicker Greg Zuerlein led the league with 158 points. Punter Johnny Hekker and the coverage unit finished No. 2 with a 44.3-yard net average per punt. And wide receiver Pharoh Cooper set the stage with a 27.4-yard kick return average, plus a 12.5-yard punt return average.

Cooper and the return team had a significant effect on the Rams’ starting field position. The club led the league with an average drive start at their own 33.0-yard line. That’s one reason why even though the Rams were No. 1 in scoring, the club finished No. 10 in total yards.

Zuerlein, Hekker, and the coverage teams were elite in that regard as well, as Los Angeles’ opponents started their drives on average at their own 27.5. That ranked No. 9 in the league in 2017.

4) Awards season

Pro Bowlers and AP All-Pros have already been announced, and the PFWA awards are on the way this week. But the Rams also have some contenders for awards announced during the NFL Honors ceremony on Feb. 3 in Minnesota.

Running back Todd Gurley is a MVP candidate after leading the league with 2,093 yards from scrimmage, 19 total touchdowns, and 13 rushing touchdowns. Plus, Gurley finished No. 2 with 1,305 yards rushing. And he did it all in just 15 games, as McVay chose to rest the Georgia product in Week 17.

With 11.0 sacks, five forced fumbles, 15 tackles for loss, and 27 quarterback hits, Donald has vaunted himself into the conversation for Defensive Player of the Year. According to Pro Football Focus, Donald also led the league with 91 quarterback pressures. The fourth-year pro played only 14 regular-season games in 2017.

And McVay is a clear candidate for Coach of the Year, after leading the Rams to all of the aforementioned accomplishments in this post. At just 31 years old, McVay became the youngest head coach to lead a team to the playoffs in NFL history with Los Angeles’ NFC West title in 2017 — the franchise’s first division championship since 2003.

5) Now, what’s next?

Aside from the Pro Bowl and NFL Honors, the Rams’ work of improving the roster over the course of the offseason has already begun. Los Angeles selected six players who attended the Senior Bowl last year in the 2017 NFL Draft, and that event will run the week of Jan. 22.

But the Rams also have a number of upcoming high-profile free agents, including cornerback Trumaine Johnson, safety Lamarcus Joyner, wide receiver Sammy Watkins, and outside linebacker Connor Barwin.

General manager Les Snead said last week that the Rams’ staff would likely take a couple weeks before coming back after the Super Bowl to really dig in and examine how all the players may or may not fit for the future.

“That’s the biggest piece of the puzzle is all right how do we stay in this window where we expect to compete for a division, expect to win the division,” Snead said. “And we do have a young team so it is sustainable, but it’s solving that riddle. And I think it’s best for us to sit down, take a little bit of an emotional break and come back and try to be rational and smart in our thinking.”