The Detroit Lions have had their share of turnover in the coaching staff in recent years. At this time last year, offensive coordinator Ben Johnson (Chicago Bears) and defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn (New York Jets) were on their way to head coaching jobs, and a few weeks later, head coach Dan Campbell’s staff was flipped upside down as several coaches went to pursue new opportunities.
The total product has impacted the Lions in some ways as they have an 8-5 record and are fighting for their playoff lives ahead of Sunday’s game against the Los Angeles Rams. But while they’ve adapted as the season has gone along, they lost a member of their staff on Tuesday when The Detroit Free Press’ Dave Birkett reported that tight ends coach Tyler Roehl is expected to accept the offensive coordinator job at Iowa State.
Hearing that a coach is leaving will trigger some memories of last year’s “brain drain” for Lions fans. But it also isn’t a massive loss considering Roehl’s career path and the performance of the Lions' tight ends this season.
Tyler Roehl’s Departure Shouldn’t Hurt Lions’ Playoff Push
Roehl’s career began as a player at North Dakota State, and he eventually found his way onto the coaching staff in 2014. Working his way up from a running backs and tight ends coach to offensive coordinator, Roehl was reportedly a finalist for the head coaching job, according to The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead’s Dom Izzo, after Matt Entz left the Bison to become the linebackers’ coach at USC following the 2023 season.
When the job went to Tim Polasek, Roehl went on his own path, accepting a job as Eddie George’s offensive coordinator at Tennessee State but changing course to become the assistant head coach and running backs coach under Matt Campbell at Iowa State. After one season, Roehl joined the Lions as the new tight ends coach to replace Steve Heiden, who left to join Glenn’s coaching staff with the Jets and it appeared to be a Campbell decision as Izzo reported Roehl met Campbell during Trey Lance’s Pro Day in 2021.
“We just started talking off on the side and picking each other’s brains,” Roehl said. “That’s where it started years ago.”
Offensive coordinator John Morton praised Roehl back in September, citing his background as “an O-line type of guy” and helping the Lions' TEs as blockers via Lions team reporter Tim Twentyman. But except LaPorta, who posted a career-high 82.0 overall grade and a 60.6 pass blocking grade according to Pro Football Focus before suffering a back injury, Roehl hasn’t gotten the most out of his group, with Brock Wright (52.1) and Shane Zylstra (49.6) posting low grades.
PFF grades aren’t the be-all, end-all when it comes to a coach, and injuries to LaPorta, Zylstra (ankle), and Wright (neck) haven’t helped Roehl. But it’s also possible that Roehl took the opportunity to learn under Campbell and set himself up for a bigger collegiate job when the opportunity became available.
It’s a similar approach to the coach Roehl will be working under in Ames. According to Stuart Mandel of The Athletic, Jimmy Rogers considered Iowa State to be his dream job and even asked athletic director Jamie Pollard how he could make that a reality after meeting him at a fundraising event while he was head coach at South Dakota State.
“I told him, you’re probably going to need to go one more level (up) before you get here. And we stayed in contact,” Pollard recalled. “When I asked him why he was going to Washington State, he said, ‘It was because you told me I needed to go to the next level.”
After one year with the Cougars, Rogers took the job with the Cyclones, and things like this happen all the time with coaching staffs. You can see the parallels in Roehl's path as Campbell learned under Bill Parcells and Sean Payton before getting his job with the Lions, and current defensive coordinator Kelvin Sheppard learned under Campbell and Glenn before getting his current job.
With the Lions getting modest production from their tight ends, losing Roehl shouldn’t throw a wrench into Detroit’s playoff push, and it could present another opportunity for an aspiring coach and perhaps an improvement from the position heading into the offseason.