Gray Expected To Join Falcons

At the end-of-season press conference held earlier this month, Matt LaFleur said he didn’t anticipate making any staff changes. He was either fibbing or hadn’t yet spoken to defensive backs coach and passing game coordinator Jerry Gray, who, according to a report from NFL Network’s Mike Garafolo, is expected to be hired by the Falcons in the next few days.

Gray chose not to extend his contract with the Packers and became a coaching free agent at the conclusion of the regular season. He interviewed with multiple teams in the past couple of weeks, so his departure didn’t come as a surprise.

Gray figures to coach the DBs in Atlanta, which would make this the second consecutive offseason that a defensive assistant left for a similar job with another team. Outside linebackers coach Mike Smith moved to Minnesota last year. While lateral moves do occur, they’re not common. That begs the question, why did Gray and Smith want out of Green Bay?

It’s possible that Smith wanted to rejoin mentor and longtime close friend Mike Pettine and that Gray preferred being 500 miles closer to his home state of Texas. Of course, it’s also possible that neither man wanted to continue working under defensive coordinator Joe Barry, who’s not nearly as well-regarded around the National Football League as they are.

Looking back, this move may have been foreshadowed several months ago. Gray responded matter-of-factly when asked why the defensive backs played such soft coverage in a Week 5 loss to the Giants: “Coach Barry is the architect and defensive coordinator, so he’ll answer those questions tomorrow… We gotta be more aggressive ourselves and not wait for schematics to tell us what to do.” Gray seemed as frustrated as the fans with a game plan that made very little sense.

Regarding a possible replacement for Gray, one name to keep in mind is Aubrey Pleasant. He joined the Packers as an offensive consultant a couple of weeks after being fired by the Lions last October but spent the previous five seasons as a defensive backs coach, including one year with LaFleur (2017) and four years with Barry (2017-2020) on the LA Rams staff.
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