Ryan Grubb explains his abrupt Alabama exit, why Seahawks’ OC job’s his ‘unicorn event’
This — not UW, not Alabama — is where Ryan Grubb has wanted to go. For years.
And this is the coach he’s wanted to be with once he got there.
Grubb’s first public comments as the Seahawks’ new offensive coordinator Thursday were that his new job is so perfect, it’s, well...mythical.
“Man, this is like the unicorn event in coaching,” Grubb said at the Seahawks’ Virginia Mason Athletic Center, across Lake Washington from where he was Washington’s offensive coordinator the last two college seasons.
He described how he met new Seahawks head coach Mike Macdonald. It was at last year’s NFL scouting combine in Indianapolis.
Grubb was there in March 2023 as the University of Washington’s offensive coordinator, guiding Huskies quarterback Michael Penix Jr. through a league event for underclassmen with NFL futures. Macdonald was scouting collegians entering the draft last year, in his second and final year as the defensive coordinator for the Baltimore Ravens.
The Seahawks hired the 36-year-old Macdonald Jan. 31 to replaced fired Pete Carroll as coach.
“I met Mike about a year ago. Started building a relationship and not with any necessarily end in mind, but just how the process goes in the football world,” Grubb said Thursday. “And I got to know him throughout a couple different conversations and just kind of built that relationship over time.”
Grubb was smart. He was like many in the NFL and who know football: He saw the detailed, innovative Macdonald was on his way to becoming the NFL’s youngest head coach.
He became that after his disguised, confusing Ravens defense became the first unit in league history to lead it in points allowed, sacks and turnovers this past season.
“(I) kind of knew that potentially there’d be an opportunity like this down the line. Didn’t necessarily think it’d happen the very first year,” Grubb said. “But that was really the first part, and (we) just stayed in communication as Mike, obviously, had a great season as a coordinator for the Ravens. (I) knew that his name would come up in some search opportunities, and luckily for me, he ended right here in Seattle.”
Sure beats Tuscaloosa.
Ryan Grubb’s quick Alabama tenure
Grubb was in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, last week. He was introducing himself to a University of Alabama football booster group on national scholarship signing day as the Crimson Tide’s new offensive coordinator.
Grubb had followed Kalen DeBoer from UW to Alabama last month, days after the former Huskies head coach took the Crimson Tide head job from retiring Nick Saban. Grubb had also followed DeBoer coaching from NAIA Sioux Falls in the late 2000s to Eastern Michigan (2014-16), to Fresno State in 2017 and to Washington before the 2022 college season.
Two days after the Huskies lost to Michigan in the national championship game last month, Saban retired. The same day, Jan. 10, the Seahawks fired Carroll. That same week, the Crimson Tide quickly hired DeBoer away from UW.
Grubb publicly stated he wanted to succeed DeBoer, stay at UW and become the Huskies’ head coach. Instead, Washington president Ana Mari Cauce and Huskies athletic director Troy Dannen hired former University of Arizona coach Jedd Fisch as UW’s new coach on Jan. 14.
So Grubb then re-joined DeBoer, at Alabama. Grubb recruited for the Crimson Tide for 2 1/2 weeks. In that span, the Seahawks hired Macdonald to replace Carroll. Seahawks general manager John Schneider and Macdonald considered multiple candidates to be Seattle’s offensive coordinator.
Grubb was at the top of that list from the start.
But...
“That was really the point, was to take the job down there and be the offensive coordinator — and nothing was set here,” Grubb said. “Mike was going through his process and trying to make the best decisions he could for the Seahawks, and so nothing was set.
“And so I had to keep moving forward with the job that I had taken, and that was the Alabama offensive coordinator job. So I just had to trust the process and know that it would end up the right way.”
Then last weekend, two days after he talked to those boosters on Alabama’s signing day, Grubb left to return to Seattle as the Seahawks’ new play caller.
Grubb said it wasn’t easy for Grubb to leave DeBoer and Alabama. And he agrees the timing was suboptimal.
“I thought about that process a lot of times, honestly,” Grubb said, “so I think just in the situation we were in made it tougher. Just that he was getting it started out in Alabama and wanted to be there for him.
“But I knew this is what, ultimately, I wanted to do, if the right situation came up.
“The timing is so difficult to really describe. So I think that was the hardest part, being in that position where the timing wasn’t going to be perfect. And I think in this industry, the people that are in it, you just know that the timing’s never going to be perfect. So best possible scenario, you’d love those timelines to marry up a little bit better. And obviously that was the hardest part, honestly.”
But now, for he and his wife Stephanie and their daughter Falynn, Grubb is back in an almost mystical place.
“Man, this is like the unicorn event in coaching,” Grubb said. “So the fact that I got to stay right here and do it in a city, in a place that I already love and I’ve had two years to let it marinate as far as what John Schneider does here and the ownership with the Seahawks, and just how classy an organization this is, and how driven they are to success, it makes it really special.
“When you think about making this step, you want to do it hopefully with a program, (an) organization that you believe in, and so to be able to do that was unbelievable.”
How long had Grubb had his eyes on calling an NFL offense?
“I would say three years ago is the first time I really started looking at (if) I want to pursue NFL or being a head coach,” Grubb said. “And not that it was going to happen at that moment, but that’s really when I started to kind of dive more into NFL film. Start(ed) talking to more people that were in the NFL and started to research what that would look like both in schematic transformation and then just lifestyle and things like that.”
Grubb’s Seahawks offense
Macdonald, Grubb, assistant head coach Leslie Frazier, new defensive coordinator Aden Durde, new special-teams coach Jay Harbaugh and the rest of the Seahawks’ new coaching staff are not going to the NFL combine at the end of this month.
The coaches are staying in Renton to install the offense and defense in preparation for scouting and drafting players into the new system. Schneider and his scouting, personnel and medical staffs will be in Indianapolis into the first week of March. The coaches’ eyes-on time with college prospects will come at Pro Days on campuses across the country in March into April. The draft is April 25-27.
Grubb will be installing a new Seahawks offense he and Macdonald says will have a physical running game with returning third- and second-year backs Kenneth Walker and Zach Charbonnett as its foundation. Building on that, Grubb will take shots at big passing plays down the field with two-time Pro Bowl quarterback Geno Smith.
As expected, the Seahawks are keeping Smith, 33, on the roster through this week, triggering a full guarantee of his $12.7 million base salary for 2024.
Michael Penix Jr. throwing for over 4,600 and 4,900 yards with 67 total passing touchdowns the last two seasons at UW left the perception Grubb’s offense is a deep-strike aerial circus that chucks passes all the time, all over the field.
Lost in that perception: The fact that Grubb had running back Dillon Johnson also rush for 1,195 yards with 16 touchdowns this past college season.
“Yeah, I think over the course of my career, we’ve done both, certainly,” Grubb said of run and pass. “I think when you look at what we did, probably more specifically at UW over the last two seasons, we were accentuating the positives, and there’s three receivers that are probably going to get drafted this year. And so I think moving the football through the air was a logical choice.”
“(We) are going to be a physical team in Seattle. And over the years, that’s something that we’ve certainly done. When the components all matched up, we ran the ball very effectively and I look forward to it. I think that when you have an established run game, it makes calling those other plays, the auxiliary plays off of it, a lot easier honestly.
“It’s when you don’t have the presence of a run game that things can get really tricky.”
Scott Huff comes from UW to Seahawks, too
Grubb will be installing his Seahawks offense with a friend and colleague from Washington’s staff that won 21 consecutive games until the loss last month to Michigan for the national title.
Scott Huff, UW’s offensive line coach since 2017, is the Seahawks’ new offensive line coach for Macdonald and Grubb, a former O-line coach himself.
Huff led what was voted as the best line in college football last season.
“Oh yeah, I mean I think that continuity and the translation upfront is really important. I’ve always felt like Scott was an NFL-caliber line coach,” Grubb said. “He’s had opportunities to leave in the past, and so to be able to do it and have our system, I think it really helps the installation process and the beginning points for the team just to be able to help with the translation part, that you don’t have to worry about how things are going to be taught or said and things like that.
“I think it’s a huge component.”
Seahawks hire another young coach
As Grubb spoke Thursday, the Seahawks were finalizing hiring Los Angeles Rams pass game specialist Jake Peetz as Grubb’s and Seattle’s new pass game coordinator, sources told Mike Garafolo of the league’s television network.
Peetz, 38, is two years older than Macdonald.
Harbaugh, Seattle’s new special-teams coach who met the Seahawks’ head man at Baltimore and coached with him in 2021 at Michigan, is two years younger than Macdonald.
Peetz was a Rams offensive assistant the last two seasons. He was reportedly a candidate to replace former Seahawks quarterbacks coach Dave Canales as the offensive coordinator for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, after Canales became the Carolina Panthers’ head coach.
Peetz was the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at LSU in 2021. He’s also been the quarterbacks coach with the Panthers (2020) and Oakland Raiders (2017).
Two more offensive assistants
Schneider, Macdonald and Grubb reportedly settled on two more position coaches for the new offense.
The Seahawks are about to hire veteran assistant Kennedy Polamalu, 60, to coach running backs. He’s had that job in the NFL for the Raiders the last two seasons, the Vikings from 2017-21, the Jaguars (2005-09) and the Browns (2004). He’s coached a 1,000-yard rusher in seven NFL seasons. Those backs include Fred Taylor, Maurice Jones-Drew, Dalvin Cook and Josh Jacobs.
The Seahawks are intent on Walker joining Polamalu’s stable of 1,000-yard rushers he’s coached.
Polamalu was Carroll’s first special-teams coordinator then his running backs coach at USC for four seasons in the early 2000s.
Seattle is also going to hire former Pittsburgh Steelers wide receivers coach Frisman Jackson for the same job with the Seahawks, ESPN’s Jeremy Fowler reported.
Jackson has been a receivers coach for 11 college seasons and another five in the NFL (for Tennessee, Carolina and, the last two years, Pittsburgh). Jackson, 44, played five NFL seasons as a wide receiver for Cleveland, 2002-06.
This story was originally published February 16, 2024 at 5:00 AM.
