Now that the dust has settled around Marc Trestman, the man the Ravens hired as their fourth offensive coordinator in four years, it seems opinions are starting to form around the hire. Here's a brief roundup of what they're saying about Trestman, the longtime NFL coordinator and former Chicago Bears head coach.
In his first comments since being named Ravens offensive coordinator Tuesday, Marc Trestman made one thing clear: he has no plans to make sweeping changes with the offense.
"It's never going to be my offense. It's always going to be the Ravens' offense," Trestman said in a conference call today. "I've been in this situation before in two or three occasions. The framework and formula of this is for me to go in and learn the offense, learn the nuances of the offense."
Ravens coach John Harbaugh said Trestman's experience with a West Coast offense and ability to offer continuity in the scheme that the team ran successfully this past season factored prominently in the decision to hire the former Chicago Bears head coach as the team's offensive coordinator.
For the second consecutive year the Ravens have hit a home run with their offensive coordinator hire.
This time last year, bringing on Gary Kubiak was seen as quite the coup, given the success he'd had the two previous seasons in Houston before the 2013 debacle. Not to mention Kubiak had been a success as an offensive coordinator in Denver for many years before becoming a head coach.
With Kubiak chasing his dream job, to return to Denver, the Ravens have struck gold again by hiring former Chicago Bears coach Marc Trestman.
The Baltimore Ravens interviewed Adam Gase on Monday, and it seemed a matter of time before the Ravens announced they'd hired the NFL's hottest young play-caller as their offensive coordinator.
Instead, Ravens coach John Harbaugh went in a completely different direction. He named Marc Trestman his offensive coordinator Tuesday, a move that makes plenty of sense for the Ravens but will draw some skepticism.
The buzzworthy choice would've been Gase, a 36-year-old wunderkind who was calling plays for the highest-scoring offense the past two seasons. Trestman is more Tecmo Bowl than Madden in comparison. He is the league's third-oldest offensive coordinator, at 59, who is considered either the revered "Quarterback Whisperer" or a bit of a gamble, based on the fact that five of his past seven years were spent in the Canadian Football League.
(Note: this was published just before the hire, but explains the rationale well)
Marc Trestman built an effective offense during his time with the Bears and coaxed one of the all-time great half-seasons out of Josh McCown, but his defense failed and the team collapsed in 2014. Baltimore has a history of targeting talented veteran coaches who were recently fired elsewhere, like Kubiak, Dean Pees, and Juan Castillo, and Trestman runs a variant of the West Coast offense that Kubiak ran during his year in Baltimore.
The Bears were a disaster in 2014, but Trestman has found success in offense-only roles in the past. Doing the same in Baltimore will rehab his reputation a bit, although it's probably a stretch to think that he can follow Kubiak's lead to make a quick return to a head coaching position.