Greg Schiano Quits New England Patriots’ Coaching Staff

Coaches quit all the time in the NFL but it’s highly unusual when a coach quits a job that he doesn’t officially have yet. That’s exactly what happened earlier this week with the New England Patriots and Greg Schiano. Schiano abruptly quit his presumptive gig as the Patriots’ defensive coordinator before he’d been announced as the new hire.

The 52 year old Schiano has held a number of positions in college and pro coaching. He was head coach of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2012 and 2013 and served as Ohio State’s defensive coordinator for the past three seasons. He’s also been the head coach at Rutgers where among others he coached Bill Belichick’s son Steven who currently serves as the Patriots’ safety coach. In 2017, he appeared to be the next head coach at the University of Tennessee until the school gave in to a somewhat misinformed public outcry over Schiano’s connection to the Jerry Sandusky era at Penn State. Schiano had been a Graduate Assistant at Penn State in 1990 and the Defensive Backs coach from 1991 to 1995.

Schiano released this somewhat cryptic statement on Thursday:

“I have informed Mr. [Robert] Kraft and Coach Belichick that I am stepping down from my position at the Patriots. This is not the result of any one event, but rather a realization that I need to spend more time on my faith and family. I don’t want to look back years from now and wish I had done things differently. Therefore, I am taking time away from the game to recalibrate my priorities.”

Coach Belichick’s statement was concise but clear:

“I respect Coach Schiano greatly and appreciate his contributions to our staff and team. He is a friend who we support completely.”

The unusual nature of Schiano’s departure has left many questioning his explanation and theorizing on why he really left. Ohio State alum Albert Breer of The MMQB follows the program closely and thinks that Schiano’s rationale is legit:

“My understand is this is pretty much exactly how he laid it out in the statement; this is family related. He has a daughter who is a big-time soccer recruit, and will wind up going to a really big school for soccer. [She is in high school] and I think that was a factor. Picking up and moving his family was a factor, and a piece of this at the very least.”

Breer did speculate that Schiano might have expected to have more control in New England:

“What you can speculate on of course is the idea the Bill’s defensive coordinators don’t have a lot of autonomy. Greg has been a head coach and is used to having a lot of autonomy. But I think it’s probably more about the family than anything else, that is at least that is my understanding. But I would leave the possibility open that part of this had to do with how he fit into the staff as well.”

He concluded by admitting that it was a ‘strange situation’ but that he hasn’t been able to find any type of scandal or other cause:

“It’s a strange situation and I’m not trying to downplay that part of it. But as far as I can tell right now, there is nothing crazy about this one. … Maybe there is [a scandal], but I haven’t been able to find it. I know a lot of people at the Ohio State program, and the idea that he would do this and pull the plug because his family is important to them doesn’t seem foreign to them.”

New England is now in desperate need of coaches on the defensive side of the ball. Last year’s defensive play caller Brian Flores left to take the head coaching position at Miami. Currently, the only defensive coach listed on the team’s website is Bill Belichick’s son Steve. The current Super Bowl futures odds show New England as a co-second choice with New Orleans at +800. The Kansas City Chiefs are the favorite at +750.