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The 2010 Redskins coaching staff is really starting to take shape now, as the team today named Kyle Shanahan offensive coordinator, Matt LaFleur quarterbacks coach and Jon Embree tight ends coach.
Shanahan — son of head coach Mike Shanahan — has long been reported for this position, and I’ll have a little more on him in just a bit. But the other two names were newer to me.
Matt LaFleur, as near as I can tell, must have become Kyle Shanahan’s right-hand man somewhere along the line. As an offensive assistant in Houston last season, LaFleur (pictured to the right with John David Booty) worked with the quarterbacks while Shanahan ran the offense; the year prior LaFleur worked with the wide receivers.
So all the gaudy numbers that are attached to Kyle Shanahan and the Houston offense — first in the NFL in passing with 4,654 yards! fourth in total offense with 6,129 yards! — have to reflect at least a little bit on LaFleur as well.
Which is pretty impressive for a guy who came to the NFL from Division II Ashland University. LaFleur described the transition in a December 2009 profile in the Saginaw (Michigan) News:
“Honestly, it was pretty overwhelming at first,” he said of coaching in the NFL. “It’s exposed me to a level of football I’d never seen before.“When you go from Division II to the NFL, you’re amazed at how good these guys really are.”
Despite the aw-shucks tone of those quotes, the rest of the article — and LaFleur’s swift rise through the coaching ranks — paints him as a guy to keep an eye on.
There’s not a lot out there about new tight ends coach Jon Embree, but what there is seems promising.
He’s had success at just about every stop — two of the guys he coached in college won the John Mackey Award for best tight end: Daniel Graham at Colorado and Marcedes Lewis at UCLA. Possibly even more significant than the award is the fact that neither one ever seemed to match their collegiate prowess afterward. Graham has had a very successful NFL career primarily as a blocking TE, and Marcedes Lewis has put up a respectable-but-not-stellar 1,524 yards over his four-year NFL career — 21st in the NFL over that span. Which would seem to imply, among other factors, a coach who was able to get the best out of them during their college careers.
Embree has certainly inspired loyalty in the boosters at the University of Colorado, one of whom posted a 1,200 word plea on Facebook back in November for the university to bring Embree — a Colorado alum and former assistant — in as head coach. Some relevant excerpts from the reasoning (not including the Mackey Award stuff, which I’ve already covered):
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Clik here to view.–As a Tight End for Colorado (’83-86), Jon was a major reason for program’s rise to national prominence under former Head Coach Bill McCartney. He was named first team all-Big 8 and finished his CU tenure in the top five of two separate career categories; receptions (80) and receiving yards (1,116). The Los Angeles Rams selected him in the 6th round of the 1987 NFL Draft. He went on to play with the Rams for two seasons.
And
– In addition to being an assistant coach on both sides of the ball and special teams (TE’s, WR’s, DE’s, ST’s) in his 18 years of college/NFL experience, Embree was also the ASST. HEAD COACH AND PASSING GAME COORDINATOR FOR THREE YEARS AT UCLA (’03-05) under Coach Karl Dorell. In his final season with the Bruins, the team finished with a 10-2 record and the UCLA offense finished 7th nationally in points per game (38.09). He was the passing game coordinator which is considered by many colleges as the co-offensive coordinator these days.
And
–While with the Kansas City Chiefs, Embree coached Tony Gonzales for three years. The 12-year veteran TE experienced two of his four 1,000 yard-plus receiving campaigns including the only back-to-back 1,000 yard seasons in his career (1,172 in ’07, 1,058 in ’08).
So, yeah, that sounds like a good résumé for a tight ends coach to me. More on Kyle Shanahan shortly.
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