NFL Staff Updates: Jaguars, Browns, Bengals, Buccaneers, Packers
Yesterday, the Jaguars announced new titles for two assistant coaches. Pass game coordinator Shane Waldron and special teams coordinator Heath Farwell both received promotions that will add “assistant head coach” and “associate head coach” to their respective titles.
Waldron joined the team last year, following the end of his second offensive coordinator job in the NFL. A branch off the Sean McVay coaching tree, Waldron arrived in Washington the year before McVay accepted the head coaching job in Los Angeles and spent four years with the Rams before joining the procession of coaches leaving for offensive coordinator opportunities. Waldron called plays for three years in Seattle and half a season in Chicago before being dismissed. He didn’t seem to receive any coordinator attention this offseason, but Jacksonville will secure Waldron in place for now with the title bump.
Farwell has been on the staff in Duval for four years now, joining the team under former head coach Doug Pederson in 2022. Jacksonville is Farwell’s second coordinator position after a three-year stint with the Bills. Under Farwell, longtime punter Logan Cooke earned second-team All-Pro honors for the first time in his career in 2024, while second-year kicker Cam Little converted kicks of 70 yards (longest recorded successful field goal in a game at any level of organized football [preseason]), 68 yards (longest field goal in NFL history), and 67 yards (longest outdoor field goal, second-longest field goal in NFL history) last year.
Here are a few other staff updates from around the NFL:
- The Browns also announced a title change earlier this week. On Monday, Cleveland promoted Chris Cooper from vice president to senior vice president of football administration. Cooper joined the team 12 years ago as director of football administration and has worked his way up over that time. Alongside key staffers in football operations and player personnel Cooper works to reach and execute player contracts, manage the team’s salary cap, and oversee area’s related to the team’s relationship with the NFL and NFLPA.
- Also on Monday, Cincinnati announced a promotion in its analytics department. Bengals senior application director Tyler Gross has been promoted to director of football applications, per ESPN’s Ben Baby. Gross has been with the team since 2018 and works closely with Cincinnati’s director of football research, Sam Francis, in analytics.
- After getting replaced in early February at the end of the season, former Buccaneers passing game coordinator Kefense Hynson has landed a coaching job elsewhere, as expected. Per Greg Auman of FOX Sports, Hynson has been named the pass game coordinator at UCF for the 2026 season, returning to the collegiate coaching ranks where he spent 22 years before joining the Buccaneers.
- Lastly, the Packers have added Ty Carlisle as an analytics intern for the 2026 season, per neRd quality. The Buffalo grad spent two years as a coaching analyst with the Bulls while studying industrial engineering.
Buccaneers Add Ken Zampese, T.J. Yates To Offensive Staff
With Zac Robinson taking over as their offensive coordinator, the Buccaneers recently made two other key hires on that side of the ball, per Aaron Wilson of KPRC 2. Ken Zampese will serve as a senior offensive assistant, and former NFL QB T.J. Yates will work as the Buccaneers’ passing game coordinator.
Yates is replacing Kefense Hynson, the Bucs’ passing game coordinator in 2025, Jonathan Jones of CBS Sports reports. Hynson’s expected to coach elsewhere next season.
Considering Robinson’s history with Zampese and Yates, it’s no surprise they’re accompanying him to Tampa Bay.
Zampese was a senior offensive assistant in Atlanta during Robinson’s run as the Falcons’ offensive coordinator from 2024-25. Yates was the Falcons’ QBs coach in 2024 before moving to passing game coordinator/wide receivers coach this past season.
Zampese is now set to reunite with Buccaneers signal-caller Baker Mayfield, whom the Browns took first overall in the 2018 draft. Mayfield spent his first NFL season with Zampese, then the Browns’ QBs coach, and finished second in Offensive Rookie of the Year voting.
With Mayfield entrenched as Tampa Bay’s starter eight years later, Robinson, Zampese and Yates are walking into a better QB situation than they had in Atlanta. The Falcons made huge investments in free agent signing Kirk Cousins and first-round pick Michael Penix Jr. heading into the 2024 campaign, but neither lived up to expectations over the past two seasons.
While Cousins and Penix combined to throw for the fifth-most yards in 2024, they put up a below-average passer rating (86.6) and tossed just two more touchdowns (21) than interceptions (19). The Cousins-Penix tandem dramatically lowered their INT total to eight in 2025, but they plummeted to 19th in yards and only threw 19 TDs.
The Buccaneers finished one spot worse than the Falcons in passing yards this season, though a slew of costly injuries contributed to Mayfield’s drop in production from a career-best 2024 showing. Wide receivers Mike Evans, Chris Godwin and Jalen McMillan combined to miss 30 games. Stalwart offensive linemen Tristan Wirfs, Luke Goedeke and Cody Mauch combined for 26 absences.
Godwin, McMillan, Wirfs, Goedeke and Mauch are sure to return to Tampa Bay next season, though Evans and tight end Cade Otton are a little over a month from reaching free agency. Evans and Otton are important parts of the Buccaneers’ passing attack, but it’s anyone’s guess if Yates will have an opportunity to work with either of them in 2026.
Evans’ exit would still leave the Bucs with Godwin, McMillan and Emeka Egbuka atop their receiving corps. Nevertheless, losing the franchise icon after 12 years would be a significant blow.
Up front, Wirfs, Goedeke, Mauch and the rest of the Buccaneers’ offensive linemen will have a new assistant OL coach in Andrew Mitchell, according to Pete Thamel of ESPN. An NFL lineman from 2010-12, Mitchell spent 2025 as Oklahoma State’s O-line coach. Mitchell blocked at Oklahoma State for Robinson, then the team’s QB, from 2008-09. Seventeen years later, Robinson is giving Mitchell his first pro coaching position. Mitchell will work under offensive line coach Kevin Carberry in Tampa Bay.
Buccaneers To Hire Charlie Strong
A college head coach throughout the 2010s, Charlie Strong had settled on the analyst level recently. He spent his second tour of duty at Alabama in that role in 2023, but the ex-Louisville, Texas and South Florida HC is heading back to the NFL.
Strong will join Todd Bowles‘ Buccaneers staff as defensive line coach, NFL.com’s Ian Rapoport reports. This will mark Strong’s second job as an NFL assistant. He was previously on Urban Meyer‘s 2021 Jaguars staff, being in place as inside linebackers coach that season. Long will replace longtime Bowles assistant Kacy Rodgers, whose contract had expired. Rodgers is now with the Lions.
In addition to Strong, the Bucs are adding to their offensive staff. Tampa Bay is hiring Kefense Hynson as its pass-game coordinator, NFL.com’s Tom Pelissero adds. Like Strong, Hynson has spent his career at the college level. Unlike Strong, this will be Hynson’s first NFL gig. He comes over after an extended run as Oregon State’s wide receivers coach.
Strong, 64, stayed one season under Meyer but is better known for his college roles. He submitted 11-2 and 12-1 college seasons, with Teddy Bridgewater at the controls at Louisville during the 2012 and ’13 campaigns, en route to a Texas offer. The successful ACC leader was unable to turn around the Texas program at that point, losing seven games in each of his three seasons running the then-Big 12 program. He fared better to start his South Florida tenure, going 10-2 in 2017, but did not impress over the final two years of that stay and was eventually fired.
Previously serving as defensive coordinator at South Carolina and Florida, Strong has been in coaching since 1983. Hynson started in 2003, becoming a college coordinator (at the Division I-FCS level) by 2007. For the past seven years, Hynson served as pass-game coordinator at Oregon State. He moved up to interim HC in 2023 and was retained under new HC Trent Bray in 2024. Hynson, 44, mentored the likes of Luke Musgrave and Isaiah Hodgins in that time.
This represents another dive into the college ranks for the Bucs, who added Liam Coen from Kentucky last year. Coen had prior NFL experience as an OC, with the Rams in 2022, and has already departed for a head coaching gig. The Bucs promoted Josh Grizzard to take his place. Hynson will work under Grizzard, while Strong will operate as a Bowles lieutenant — for a team that does not employ a traditional defensive coordinator.