NFL insider reveals surprising details about Ben Johnson not choosing Jaguars job
• Albert Breer shares detials about Ben Johnson’s decision to pick the Bears.
Early in the hiring cycle. the Jacksonville Jaguars were zeroing in on Ben Johnson to fill their coaching vacancy. Although there appeared to be mutual interest, he ended up choosing the Chicago Bears. It all turned out fine for the Jags, though, as they nabbed Liam Coen. That said, Albert Breer of Sports Illustrated recently shared details about the whole ordeal, and why Johnson ultimately landed in the Windy City.
Breer recently went over Jacksonville’s coaching search and talked about how Trent Baalke ended up playing a big role in Johnson’s decision to go to the Bears.
“If you want to boil this down, the real cost of the Jaguars’ handling of this situation is the guy who’s the head coach in Chicago now. My belief is that Ben Johnson was very high on the Jaguars’ job—high enough on it to have taken the interview with Jacksonville even before they let Baalke go. Jacksonville was high on Johnson, too, enough so to discuss making a big-money offer. But in the end, I’m not sure Johnson wanted to have to push Baalke out to go there. So Johnson chose the Chicago Bears over the Las Vegas Raiders, and the Jags moved on.”
Later in his column, Breer says that Aaron Glenn, who was also in play for the job and ended up going to the New York Jets, also brought up the possibility of bringing his own front-office executive with him. However, Baalke wasn’t thrilled with the idea because it might’ve affected his right-hand man Tom Gamble. The rest of the story is well-documented:
Once Johnson took the Chicago job, the Jags made a run for Coen. When the Tampa Bay Buccaneers offered him a new deal that would’ve made him one of the highest coordinators in the NFL, they dismissed Baalke to convince him to fill their vacancy.
It worked fine for the Jaguars and Ben Johnson (but not for Trent Baalke)
The Jacksonville Jaguars would have been thrilled if they had hired Ben Johnson to replace Doug Pederson, who got his walking papers after failing to make the playoffs the past two years. However, they managed to land Liam Coen, who was also high on their wish list.
And make no mistake, Coen was no consolation prize. Even though he didn’t garner as much attention as Johnson, he certainly turned heads for his work as the offensive coordinator for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers last year.
Aside from helping Baker Mayfield have a career season, Coen turned the Tampa Bay Buccaneers from one of the worst in the league in 2023 to one of the top 5 last year. Simply put, he put in the work to earn consideration for head-coaching jobs. That’s why nobody batted an eye when the Jags made a strong push to land him.
You could make the case that Coen’s introductory press conference wasn’t inspiring, and you would be right to temper your expectations based on how things have played out for the Jaguars the last 20 years. That said, the former Buccaneers’ offensive coordinator has done enough to make you think that maybe, just maybe, he’ll be able to steer the ship in the right direction and turn Jacksonville into a perennial contender.
