Why Saints QB coach Joe Lombardi is latest name in Seahawks’ search for a new play caller
The net Pete Carroll is casting in his search for a new Seahawks offensive coordinator is so wide it now includes a Vince Lombardi family member and former officer in the Air Force.
The Seahawks have requested permission from the Saints to interview New Orleans quarterback coach and Seattle native Joe Lombardi for their vacant play-caller job. That’s according to a report Friday by Jeff Duncan of The Athletic in New Orleans. Duncan reported the Los Angeles Chargers also want to speak to Lombardi about their OC position.
Lombardi, 49, is a grandson of Vince Lombardi, the legendary coach of the Green Bay Packers who ruled the NFL during the 1960s.
Joe Lombardi is a veteran of 25 seasons as a coach. He has been an offensive coordinator twice: at Mercyhurst 2002-05 and for the Detroit Lions in 2014 and ‘15.
With the Lions and quarterback Matthew Stafford, Lombardi’s schemes were described by the league’s website as “a combination of mid- to deep-range passing routes and a power running game.”
The Lions in Lombardi’s two seasons as coordinator were ranked: 19th and 20th in the league in total offense; 28th and 32nd in rushing; 25th and 30th in rush attempts; and 12th and ninth in passing.
Those Lions were an 11-5 playoff team in Lombardi’s first season there. After Detroit got off to a 1-6 start in 2015, the Lions fired Lombardi and other members of Jim Caldwell’s staff.
Lombardi has been Drew Brees’ quarterbacks coach for Sean Payton’s Saints for the last five seasons.
Lombardi graduated from Seattle Prep, then the Air Force Academy in 1994. He served four years as an officer in the U.S. Air Force, the last two while also as a part-time volunteer coaching assistant for the University of Dayton through 1998.
Carroll is exploring multiple avenues and calling upon varied backgrounds to find his play caller to replace Brian Schottenheimer, whom he fired this month after three seasons as Russell Wilson’s coordinator. Carroll has talked to former head coaches (Doug Pederson, Anthony Lynn). He’s sought running-backs and quarterbacks coaches with a play-caller/coordinator past (Pep Hamilton) and with no full play-calling experience (Kirby Wilson and Mike Kafka) and now a QBs coach with play-calling experience (Lombardi).
A common thread to these candidates: a basis in the run game—in Pederson’s and Lombardi’s cases, particularly, using the run to set up their more well-known passing offenses.
Since the Seahawks became interested in him, Pederson told the Philadelphia Inquirer he is likely to sit out the 2021 season then reassess his coaching plans. The Eagles fired him this month less than three years after he won the Super Bowl, the quickest exit following a Super Bowl win for a coach in the league since 1972. The Bellingham native won it all on the strength of his run-pass options (RPOs) as the basis of his Eagles offense. RPOs rely on defenses having to play the run honestly, creating openings down the field in the pass game on play-action throws.
Lombardi’s offense is predicated first on a power-running game (albeit one that largely failed for him in Detroit) and short, quick throws. That fits Carroll’s stated goal for Seattle’s offense: to return to more running and shorter passes so defenses have to be more balanced opposing the Seahawks.
Wilson and Seattle’s offense sank in the latter half of the 2020 season after defenses moved strong safeties off the line of scrimmage where they had been combating Seattle’s rushing offense for years into far more two-deep-safety pass coverages. That took away Wilson’s long throws and big plays to receivers DK Metcalf and Tyler Lockett. The reason Schottenheimer is no longer the Seahawks’ play caller is Carroll felt Schottenheimer did not adapt to those two-deep coverages. Specifically, he didn’t run the ball or call enough short, quick throws to get teams out of the two-high looks.
“Frankly, I’d like to not play against two-deep looks next year, all season long,” Carroll said after the Rams upset the NFC West-champion Seahawks two weeks ago in the first round of the playoffs.
While Carroll thinks the Seahawks did not adjust well enough and run enough to counter the deep coverages they faced late in the season, he also feels they didn’t have Wilson throw it enough underneath all the deep coverage. Of Wilson’s 27 pass attempts against the Rams in Seattle’s playoff loss, only three were completions for gains of 10-19 yards.
Essentially the Seahawks each week late this season were trying to cram square pegs into round holes in the passing game.
Carroll says that’s not a Wilson thing.
“It’s really a football thing. It’s a scheme thing,” the coach said.
“I want to see if we can run the ball more effectively to focus the play of the opponents and see if we can force them to do things like we’d like them to do more — like we have been able to do that in the past.”
That means, single-high safety coverage in the middle of the field. Those are looks Seattle got more in September and October, after years of being in the top three in rushing attempts in the league. In single-high coverage, strong safeties play more like linebackers, nearer the line of scrimmage to stop the Seahawks from running.
In Carroll’s thinking, you have to run to get teams to play nearer the line to stop you from running.
The other thing that’s become evident as Carroll’s search for a new play caller enters it’s third week: the number and varied experience levels of his targets suggest he fired Schottenheimer without spending much time before his exit interview with his coordinator Jan. 11 thinking he would. It’s become evident that Carroll didn’t have candidates teed up waiting to charge into the job while Seattle’s offense struggled over the latter half of the season.
Rather, it appears while they met two weeks ago to assess how to proceed with the offense, Carroll realized Schottenheimer was not willing to return the offense to more running. That’s what Schottenheimer did in 2018, his first season with Carroll. Seattle led the league in rushing that season. Wilson threw for 35 touchdowns (second-most in his career to his 40 in 2020) against just seven interceptions.
That Seahawks team went 10-6, the worst record of Schottenheimer’s three seasons calls the team’s plays. Seattle lost at Dallas in the first round of the playoffs.
This story was originally published January 22, 2021 at 8:38 AM.
