Spagnuolo’s former assistants praise new Chiefs DC for simplifying complex schemes
Even as he was in the midst of a 2-14 season back in 2011, Josh McDaniels couldn’t help but marvel at his team.
McDaniels, now the New England Patriots’ offensive coordinator, had the same position with the then-St.Louis Rams that year. Even with just two wins, McDaniels remembers the Rams being really close — something that’s far from a given under those circumstances.
And a big reason for that, he recalled Wednesday during a Super Bowl interview session, was his boss: then-Rams head coach Steve Spagnuolo, who last week was hired as the Chiefs’ new defensive coordinator.
“I learned a lot from him because our team was as unified as any team I’d ever been on,” McDaniels said. “I think that speaks to a guy that the players wanted to play for. They never lost faith in him. His message was always clear and consistent and he treated them fairly.”
McDaniels isn’t the only Patriots assistant to have worked on Spagnuolo’s staff. Defensive line coach Brendan Daly also worked under him in St. Louis. Spagnuolo hired Daly in 2009 to be the team’s defensive line coach.
When Spagnuolo was fired after the 2011 season, McDaniels left for a post with the Patriots and Daly went to the Minnesota Vikings. But both still remember the time they worked with Spagnuolo fondly.
Now, with Spagnuolo taking over in Kansas City, both are preparing to go against their former boss in the future.
“He’s very difficult to coach against,” McDaniels said. “He’s a great human being. So he’s going to work his butt off. I know that. He’ll make any team that he’s on better and I have a lot of respect for him. Very happy for him. I’m excited to see what he does here.”
Because Daly hasn’t coached with Spagnuolo in seven years, he couldn’t speak much to the defensive coordinator’s specific schematic tendencies. But he heralded him for his teaching process.
“He’s a great person,” Daly said. “He relates to (players) as people extremely well. He understands, he figures out what makes each individual tick. I would say. Has a very good way of relating to them.
“And he has a way of explaining things schematically to simplify and get them to understand kind of the concept and the overall logic for what you’re doing as opposed to rotely memorizing calls, running defenses.”
That last element, the ability to streamline complex schemes, will likely come as a welcome relief to the Chiefs’ defensive meeting rooms after years of working with Bob Sutton’s notoriously complicated game plans.
One of the biggest knocks of Sutton’s defense was that it took younger players a long time to learn the intricacies of the scheme. Because of Spagnuolo’s teaching methods, that shouldn’t be a problem in his aggressive, blitz-heavy 4-3 approach.
“He does complicated things but makes it simple,” McDaniels said. “That’s difficult. So he can make life hard on people like me, but make it simple for the guys he’s trying to communicate with, which is, that’s not an easy skill to have.”
Spagnuolo went 10-38 overall with the Rams in three seasons, but he never lost his intensity on the sidelines or his ability to connect with his players — two things that will come in handy as he takes over for Sutton.
“He’s got a great passion for the game,” Daly said. “He really does. He enjoys what he does. He loves being around players. He loves coaching football. And he’s good at it.”