A Look Into The Lions Recent Hiring Of Derius Swinton.

Since hiring Matt Patricia about a month ago, the Lions coaching vacancies began filling up quickly. However, the vacancy at offensive assistant had yet to be filled until last Friday when they hired Derius Swinton. Swinton graduated from college at Hampton University in Virginia, before spending two years at the University of Tennessee as a graduate assistant for the defensive side of the ball. He has spent the next four years as a quality control special teams coach for the former St. Louis Rams (2009-2011) and Kansas City Chiefs (2012).

He was then hired by John Fox in 2013 to be assistant special teams coach for the Denver Broncos in 2013. Swinton stayed with Fox for three years before following him to Chicago in 2015. He left the Bears in 2016 to take the special teams coordinator position with the San Francisco 49ers. Swinton ended up returning to Chicago again in 2017, as their assistant special teams coach.

Is The Hire A Good Or Bad One?

Of Matt Patricia’s coaching hires thus far, this one sticks out as question mark. Swinton does not have any offensive coaching experience to offer heading into this new job in Detroit. After spending his college career at safety, when he entered the coaching circuit, he was a defensive graduate student before spending every year in the NFL on the special teams side of the ball.

So this is a hire that is honestly too soon to tell. His placement on the offense may have something to do with his connection to Lions offensive coordinator Jim Bob Cooter. During his time in Denver with Fox, Cooter was an offensive assistant for the team. The Lions coaching hires thus far typically have been said to have philosophical similarities when it comes to the game of football. It is possible quite that Swinton and Cooter share similar views about how an offense should be run or built, and became a factor in the Lions decision to hire Derius Swinton.

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