Kliff Kingsbury joining Los Angeles Rams’ coaching staff: Source

WOODLAND HILLS, Calif. — The Los Angeles Rams are bringing a big name onto their coaching staff.

Los Angeles is adding former Washington Commanders offensive coordinator and Arizona Cardinals head coach Kliff Kingsbury to its offensive coaching staff, a league source confirmed to The Athletic.

Kingsbury’s new role is not yet clear. The Rams have an opening at offensive coordinator after Mike LaFleur left to become the Arizona Cardinals’ head coach, and they must go through an interview process that includes satisfying the Rooney Rule, which states that the franchise must interview at least two minority or female candidates for the coordinator position.

The Rams have a strong internal candidate in passing game coordinator Nathan Scheelhaase, who interviewed for the Cleveland Browns’ head-coaching job, which went to Todd Monken. If Scheelhaase were to be named the Rams’ offensive coordinator, it could open up the passing game coordinator spot for Kingsbury. Scheelhaase could also remain in his position if Kingsbury were to take over the offensive coordinator role.

Kingsbury will bring an abundance of game-planning, leadership and play-calling experience to whichever role he ends up filling. He was head coach at Texas Tech from 2013 to 2018, where he coached Patrick Mahomes. He then was the Cardinals’ head coach from 2019 to 2022 and went 28-37-1 with one playoff appearance, in which his team lost to the Rams.

After spending the 2023 season in Los Angeles as an offensive analyst at USC, Kingsbury returned to the NFL for a two-year stint as the Commanders’ offensive coordinator. In 2024, he coached Jayden Daniels to the Offensive Rookie of the Year award as the Commanders reached the NFC Championship Game. This season, Daniels dealt with injuries as the Commanders fell to 22nd in points scored, one year after they finished fifth. The Commanders went 5-12 this season, and coach Dan Quinn decided to make a change at offensive coordinator.

Kingsbury is a passing game specialist after playing quarterback in the NFL from 2003 to 2006. His offenses are known for a spread attack that utilizes run-pass option. The Rams were long an 11-personnel offense under Sean McVay but moved to more three-tight end sets last season. That opened up a more balanced attack, and the Rams finished No. 1 in points scored as Matthew Stafford won his first MVP award.

McVay will continue to call the plays but also works to empower his assistants, and he said that would remain true with the next offensive coordinator.

“You have an overall approach, but then you have to be specific with the actual pieces and people and try to be able to maximize their potential and their best chance to be able to affect us in a positive way,” McVay said.

Kingsbury is one of three additions to the Rams’ coaching staff so far, joining special teams coordinator Bubba Ventrone and special teams assistant Kyle Hoke, who came from the Cleveland Browns.

Kliff Kingsbury hired by Rams.

Yay. Good for him.

zn wrote:

Cameron DaSilva@camdasilva
And so it begins.

Mike LaFleur and the Cardinals have requested to interview Aubrey Pleasant for their defensive coordinator job

Well shit.

wv wrote:

zn wrote:

Another way to see this is that in fact they weren’t equal. Eagles had a top defense and were also effective on offense and special teams. In contrast, the Rams offense was so strong it could put up a combined 1060 yards on Seattle in their last 2 games (counting the championship game). But it had issues on defense (the secondary) and special teams, both of which together account for the 2 losses.

I don’t take their last 2 games, as some do, as evidence that it is better to have a top defense than a top offense.

I do take their 3 games combined as evidence that a top team needs to be at least solid when it comes to its other 2 units aside from the top unit. Seattle was a top D and were more than at least solid on O and STs. Rams can’t say that, they were a top O that was less than at least solid on D and STs.

….

Well, the scores were: 21-19, 38-37, 31-27 — so thats why I think they were basically evenly matched. They definitely have different strengths/weaknesses, but when you add up all the components of Seattle and all the components of the Rams, they seem to come out purty equal when they play.

Are you saying, you think Seattle was better? Or the Rams were better?
Or something else?

w
v

I think the Rams were better. Not light years better. But better. I base that on all the various rankings produced by all the statisticians.

Because it was in Seattle, I figured the game would be a coin toss, but that the Rams would win 55% of the time.

I’m still kind of a weird combination of slight disgust, annoyance, and a sense of lost opportunity. I keep thinking about the “razor’s edge” plays, the ones that coulda gone either way, and the “team that wins the most of those wins” plays.

And that 2-point conversion. Darnold passes the ball. It falls to the ground. The whistle blows. Players start meandering. Charbonnet goes over and absently picks it up and tosses it to the ref. Teams send out their kickoff units during the commercial break. And then… suddenly… they’re reviewing it, and – presto! – 2 points for Seattle.

Without the reversal, the Rams win that game. If the Rams win that game, they get the #1 seed. If the Rams get the #1 seed, they are playing in the Super Bowl next Sunday. I believe that.

And what that comes down to, it seems, is the fluke that the knocked down ball rolled to just inside the end zone. Had it not rolled into the end zone, Charbonnet would have picked it up and tossed it to the ref, and the play would have been over even though the ball was “still live.”

And that fluke is the difference in the Rams’ season.

And Tom Mack still hasn’t moved.

You know, blacks are about 12% of the population.

Straight up, then, there should be 4/32 = 12.5% black coaches. And there were 5 until Tomlin retired and Morris was fired.

So I’m not sure about this issue.

zn wrote:

from https://theramswire.usatoday.com/story/sports/nfl/rams/2026/01/30/rams-players-who-regressed-the-most-in-2025/88433085007/?taid=697cfc5094daca0001149f2a&utm_campaign=trueanthem&utm_medium=trueanthem&utm_source=twitter

P Ethan Evans

The Rams will take a long and hard look at special teams this year after the poor season this unit had. They already changed special teams coordinators with Bubba Ventrone now at the helm and the jury is still out on what to do with kicker Harrison Mevis.

That leaves Evans, who didn’t look as good in 2025 as he had in years past. For one, Evans’ Pro Football Focus grade dropped from 79.1 in 2024 to 67.9 in 2025. His yards per punt remained steady (around 46 yards), but he had a much lower rate of punting the ball inside the 20-yard line (40.0%) in 2025 than he did in 2024 (54.5%).

C’mon. Evans is fine. What… he had one bad punt this year? Two?

I’m not looking for a replacement for Evans, if I’m the ST coach. There are bigger issues somewhere else.

zn wrote:

Zooey wrote:

That’s funny. I don’t remember you calling for Steve Ortmayer’s head when he drafted Tony Banks.

I remember a time, during the 2000 season, when some of us criticized Zygmunt. All hell broke loose. We “upstart haters” were read the full force of the law.

In a few years, defending Zygmunt could get you stoned to death. Or worse.

Those were the days. Yep. I recall that.

There are certain standards you have to meet to be a “true fan.”

wv wrote:

Vikings fired their GM. Kwesi Adofo-Mensah.

I would fire anyone who watched JJ McCarthy and decided he was a franchise QB.

Adofo-Mensa was a Princeton-Stanford-Wall-Street analytics guy, btw.

w
v

That’s funny. I don’t remember you calling for Steve Ortmayer’s head when he drafted Tony Banks.

This right here is a helluva article. The kind of article that would elicit LOL from its audience, if its audience wasn’t American.

The complex far-left network that helped put Alex Pretti in harm’s way — including encrypted chats, street alerts
By Asra Q. Nomani, Fox News
Published Jan. 26, 2026, 10:38 a.m. ET

The skirmish that led to Saturday’s fatal shooting of an agitator by Border Patrol agents in Minneapolis and the response that followed were driven by a complex network of far-left organizations with a wide range of causes, a Fox News Digital investigation found.

A coordinated web of encrypted chats, street alerts and tracking of ICE “Abductors” in a sophisticated database reviewed by Fox News Digital shows that agitators were already mobilized at the scene where 37-year-old Alex Pretti was killed minutes before any shots were fired.

ICE and Border Patrol agents were there to arrest an illegal immigrant criminal, and Pretti and others were there, outside a donut shop, to meet them as part of a strategic pattern of organized interference with law enforcement operations.

Over the following hours, a national network of socialist, communist and Marxist-Leninist cells in the United States leveraged the tragic fatality into a nationwide protest operation. While grief and outrage over Pretti’s death is genuine, the network’s real-time rapid response, using short sensational video clips and emojis as weapons of propaganda, offers a window into the disciplined logistics, messaging and coordination of far-left warriors fomenting insurgency-like confrontation with authorities.

“This level of engineered chaos is unique to Minneapolis. It is the direct consequence of far left agitators, working with local authorities,” Vice President JD Vance observed in a Sunday post on X.

The encrypted Signal messages obtained by Fox News Digital in real time show that anti-ICE “rapid responders” were actively tracking, broadcasting and summoning “backup” around federal agents outside Glam Doll Donuts on Nicollet Avenue, where the shooting happened. Local “rapid responders” made at least 26 entries into a database called “MN ICE Plates” in the critical hours before and after the killing, documenting the license plate numbers and details of alleged ICE vehicles they claimed to see around Nicollet Avenue.

The entry at row 344 read, “At the nicollet [sic] murder,” chronicling a black Jeep Wagoneer at the location with agents allegedly “involved in shooting.” Row 338 had a “Glam Doll Donuts” entry, tracking a black Ford Taurus.

At 9:50 a.m. ET, just before the killing, a user identified as “Willow” shared a 22-second video on an encrypted Signal chat for anti-ICE “rapid responders.”

“26and 3rd,” wrote “Willow,” quickly following up with, “Outside Glam Doll.”

The video showed two agents, one wearing a vest marked “POLICE,” studying the front door of Glam Doll before walking away, past a sign in the window that read, “ICE OUT OF MINNESOTA.”

As the camera rolled, the person filming yelled, “No!”

The camera followed the agents as they returned to a maroon Dodge Durango, passing another sign in the window that read, “ALL WELCOME HERE.”

In the video, someone shouted, “Get out of here!”

Just three minutes later, at 9:53 a.m. ET, a second Signal user, “Salacious B. Crumb,” escalated the alert, summoning additional responders and citing the same vehicle and agents.

“Backup needed at the Black Forest Inn parking lot on Nicollet Ave just south of 26th Street,” the message read.

“Multiple vehicles with many agents appear to be staging there,” the alert continued. “One confirmed ICE vehicle seen was a maroon Dodge Durango [plate number], but it has driven away northbound on Nicollet.” Fox News Digital has redacted the Florida license plate number included in the original message.

ICE Assistant Director Marcos Charles said Sunday that the violence on the streets was “not a coincidence,” considering the “chaos and mayhem” that agitators are fomenting in Minneapolis. At the same press conference, Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) Commander-at-Large Greg Bovino confirmed that Pretti was “on the scene several minutes” before the fatal shooting.

Video of the scene shows that as Pretti stepped into the middle of Nicollet Avenue to direct traffic, fellow agitators could be heard blowing whistles to alert locals that ICE officers were around. Soon after, Pretti ended up in a street confrontation with CBP agents, across the street from Glam Doll Donuts outside a worn storefront marked “NEW AMERICAN DEVELOPMENT CENTER,” a nonprofit focused on immigration entry programs for Somalis.

Within minutes, at about 10:05 a.m. ET, at least one CBP agent shot Pretti, killing him.

At 10:18 a.m. ET, the Signal network erupted.

Using a red phone emoji to signal an all-points alert, a message blasted out: “☎️ easy. URGENT: observers urgently requested at glam doll donuts @ 26th & nicollet [sic],” the alert continued. “an observer has been shot by ice, unknown condition, emts [emergency medical technicians] present, please be safe. EDIT: medics requested to join perimeter in case agents start gassing. be aware there are many agents and mpd [Minneapolis Police Department] officers present.”

Within minutes, far-left activists descended on Nicollet Avenue. Soon after, a video showed corrugated boxes of supplies apparently lined up on a Minneapolis sidewalk for protesters, including boxes marked “DESINER MASKS” [sic] and “FREE WINTER HATS,” next to piles of bottled water.

Within hours, socialist leaders turbocharged their “rapid responders” in Minneapolis and mobilized street protesters from New York City to Los Angeles.

Media outlets, including CNN and MSNOW, described “angry protesters” but failed to identify the ideological networks behind the mobilization, even as protesters flashed their signs with their logos and names, touting socialism, communism and Marxism, on camera.

The Minneapolis activation marked the beginning of an almost instantaneous weekend surge by far-left organizations, including hardened socialist and communist groups operating in an ecosystem that national security experts describe as an insurgent-style operation designed to exploit tragedy to wage a domestic political war.

The strategy mirrors past mobilizations, including the aftermath of George Floyd’s killing in May 2020, and exploits well-intentioned public sympathy by rapidly framing Pretti — an intensive care unit nurse at a Veterans Administration hospital — as a symbol of resistance, much like Renee Good, the first victim of an ICE shooting in Minneapolis.

Just as they responded in real-time to mobilize “comrades” to march on the streets within 12 hours of the U.S. arrest of Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro in early January, socialist, communist and Marxist-Leninist groups now frame their activation as an action within the “belly of the beast” against the “hyperimperialism” of the United States.

Based on a digital analysis of scores of rapid-response messages following the killing on Saturday, a hub of communist and socialist nonprofit organizations emerged as key organizers of the protests. Many of them are funded by American-born billionaire Neville Roy Singham, a self-declared Marxist-Leninist living in Shanghai. Some are also offshoots of the People’s Forum Inc., a nonprofit hub Singham has funded in New York City since 2017 as an “incubator” for socialist and communist groups. The People’s Forum declined requests for comment.

At 10:48 a.m. ET, BreakThrough News, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit and propaganda arm of the People’s Forum, broke the news widely of the killing, sharing a video recorded from inside the Glam Doll Donut shot of the tussle outside, punctuated by gunshots and frantic narration, “Holy s–t. What the f—!…Did they f—ing kill that guy? F—ing kidding me, dude.”

BreakThrough News put a dramatic black-and-white caption over the video: “BREAKING: Another CBP Shooting in Minneapolis.” By Sunday afternoon, the video had 4.1 million views, alongside the outlet’s calls to support the People’s Republic of China, Venezuela’s Maduro and the communist revolution in Cuba.

Before the video cuts off, someone can be heard saying, “Yo, we need people on site!”

At 11:40 a.m., BreakThrough News broadcast a 39-second video purporting to show state police charging across a street with batons, some falling as clouds of breath rose in the cold air.

Soon after, at 12:24 p.m., the Party for Socialism and Liberation – a political wing of the movement, working with shared leadership at the People’s Forum – published a quickly-made graphic, “CBP MURDERS ANOTHER IN MINNEAPOLIS,” and the message, “EXPAND THE GENERAL STRIKE!”

At the protest, Linda Sarsour, a Palestinian political operative who has led virulently anti-Israel protests with socialist organizations after the Oct. 7, 2023, attack against Israel by Hamas terrorists, rallied the crowd at the 4 p.m. protest, yelling, “We will bring this country to a halt!” The People’s Forum shared the 22-second video clip with the caption: “🚨HAPPENING NOW IN NYC.”

Other groups mobilized simultaneously, including Freedom Road Socialist Organization, a self-described Marxist-Leninist group that has waved its red flag with its acronym, “FRSO,” in the middle of the protests since Good’s killing.

Also active: the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee, which has led many of the rapid-response efforts and Black Lives Matter chapters, which led the recent stampede through a local Christian church.

See Also

Barack Obama issues rare political statement condemning DHS over Alex Pretti shooting — as Dems rally against Trump admin
By early evening, the narrative had coalesced into a chorus of voices within the far-left propaganda apparatus, adopting charged historical language to brand federal officials as Nazi-like figures. At 4:12 p.m. ET, Calla Walsh, a controversial communist activist filmed this past summer in Iran shouting, “Death to America! Death to Israel!” shared a 32-second video showing barricades built with Republic Services dumpsters.

She wrote, “People of Minneapolis build barricades, trapping ICE Gestapo at the scene of their latest murder in broad daylight. Not far from where they killed Renee Good a couple weeks ago, not far from where George Floyd was killed in 2020.”

By evening, CNN was reporting from the 4 p.m. protest in New York City but did not identify the ideological affiliations of the organizers, even as activists openly carried signs from the Party for Socialism and Liberation, with the group’s full name printed across the bottom.

Another CNN segment from Minneapolis interviewed Chris Gray, describing him only as Pretti’s “next-door neighbor.” Gray spoke about Pretti while delivering a well-scripted appeal for a general strike to dismantle the “Trump regime” and promote “non-violent resistance.” The segment did not disclose that Gray is a member of Socialist Alternative, the U.S. affiliate of the International Socialist Alternative, a “global fighting organization of workers, young people, and all those oppressed by capitalism and imperialism,” seeking to create a “socialist world.”

Soon after, however, Socialist Alternative shared the interview proudly on Instagram, noting, “Chris Gray, Socialist Alternative member and next-door neighbor of Alex Pretti, speaks out.”

By evening’s end, at 9:44 p.m. ET, Gloria La Riva, a co-founder of the Party for Socialism and Liberation who has described herself as “a communist,” posted a message on X, using the inflammatory language now normalized: “Alex Pretti was murdered in cold blood, everyone knows that. 10 shots in his back. All of Trump’s, Noem’s, Bovino’s lies cannot cover it up. The people’s struggle will only grow!”

The maroon Dodge Durango in the early Signal alerts from Saturday morning is Entry No. 2069 in the publicly shared database, “MN ICE PLATES.” It included a gallery of photos of alleged ICE vehicles.

At last count on Sunday, the database had 4,626 records of license plate numbers organized as “Highly Suspected ICE,” “Confirmed ICE,” “Suspected ICE,” “Cleared – Not ICE” and “Unknown.”

The total number of “Confirmed ICE” entries is 2,933 records. The total number of records labeled “Abductors” is 455.

A fine-print disclaimer states that the data is “for informational purposes only” and that its organizers “do not condone its use to forcibly assault, resist, oppose, impede or interfere with the official duties of any officer or employee of the United States, or of any agency in any branch of the United States Government, while engaged in or on account of the performance of official duties.”

One guide, “Best Practices Guide for Neighborhood or Area Patrol / Monitors: 612,” includes a key to emojis and the jobs they represent for rapid responders:

The maroon Dodge Durango that was allegedly outside Glam Doll Donuts on Nicollet Avenue is listed with three prior sightings: Jan. 11 at 3 p.m. at the Whipple federal detention facility, Jan. 13 at 1:15 p.m. and a final sighting at Powderhorn Park parking lot on 35th Street and 14th Avenue.

It’s listed with the tags, “Seen in a convoy, Tinted/blacked-out windows, ICE agent(s) seen in vehicle,” and a final verdict: “Confirmed ICE.”

As socialist organizations continued to dispatch their foot soldiers to Nicollet Avenue on Sunday evening, the Signal groups were as active as ever on Sunday, an alert going out at 4:37 p.m. ET, with rapid responders now chasing a black Dodge Durango around town.

“2 confirmed ICE vehicles,” the alert read, “…at least 2 agents in each vehicle.”

One gigantic turnover by the Rams. Zero turnovers by the Seahawks. The Unsportsmanlike penalty came close to balancing that, though. Xavier Smith probably Jaquiski Tartted himself out of the league.

It was close. It was always going to be close. If it was a Best of Seven series, it would go 7 games.

I’m bummed because this looked like the best chance the Rams have had since their last SB, and it was a pretty good chance, as far as chances go. I think losing home field advantage on that fluke loss in Seattle is the difference in the season outcome.

Next year looks like there will be a lot of really good teams, and to be in it, the Rams are going to need a second straight season of avoiding injuries. And a shutdown CB, and another WR.