As coaching tree branches, Lions' coordinators share best lessons learned under Campbell

Allen Park — It's becoming an increasingly realistic possibility the Detroit Lions will be on the hunt for one, potentially two new coordinators this offseason. While neither will interview for head coaching vacancies until next week, at the earliest, Ben Johnson and Aaron Glenn have nine combined requests for the league's seven openings.

Both have been with head coach Dan Campbell from the start in Detroit. Glenn, who has run Detroit's defense the past three seasons, followed Campbell from New Orleans, where they spent the previous several years working on Sean Payton's staff.

Johnson, meanwhile, was a holdover from Matt Patricia's staff in Detroit, but had previously worked with Campbell in Miami. Johnson was immediately elevated to tight ends coach in 2021, before being named the team's offensive coordinator in 2022.

Campbell is the extension of multiple coaching trees, most recently Payton, but both can be considered branches of the Bill Parcells' massive oak. Campbell played under Parcells and the legendary coach helped Campbell land his first NFL coaching job, an internship in Miami in 2010. And Payton was Parcells' quarterback coach and assistant head coach in Dallas prior to getting hired by New Orleans.

Now, with Johnson and Glenn on the potential cusp of taking over their own franchises, it's a sign Campbell's tree is about to sprout its own branches. And his influence should be felt wherever his coordinators might land.

"Listen, he’s the best leader I’ve been around, I think regardless of whichever sport I’ve been a part of," Johnson said. "It’s really impressive what he’s been able to do, being true to himself, demanding, he’s results-driven, but yet his way of delivering a message and getting it across, what to say, how to say it at the right time. I mean, it’s really unique and it’s special.

"I think it’s hard to replicate, to be honest with you," Johnson continued. "But more than anything, it’s really just being comfortable in his own skin and trusting and empowering those around him. He’s created an environment here as coordinators, as position coaches, as players that we’re very comfortable and it helps us be the best that we can be at our jobs."

Glenn, who had a 15-year NFL career where he also spent some of it playing under Parcells before transitioning to coaching, said the top lesson he's taken from his time working with Campbell in New Orleans and Detroit is how to effectively collaborate with a franchise's other leaders.

"The number one thing I think is important is, man, just the collaboration with the GM and the owner," Glenn said. "And making sure that vision, that collective vision is the same, because once that’s intact, and you keep all three of you guys, or women, saying the same thing, that feeds down to the staff, then that feeds down to the players."

Both Johnson and Glenn pushed off talk about future opportunities this week to focus on the task at hand, helping the Lions win their first playoff game since the 1991 season. The team is scheduled to play the Los Angeles Rams at Ford Field Sunday night in the Wild Card round of the postseason.

Johnson currently has five interview request and he's yet to decide which he will take from that group, while Glenn has committed to speaking with all four teams that have expressed interest in him this hiring cycle. Both can start taking virtual interviews starting next Wednesday.

jdrogers@detroitnews.com

@Justin_Rogers

Rams at Lions

Super Wild Card Weekend

▶ Kickoff: 8 p.m., Sunday, Ford Field

▶ TV/radio: NBC/97.1

▶ Records: Los Angeles (10-7), Detroit (12-5)

▶ Line: Lions by 3

▶ Outlook: The Lions will be playing their first home playoff game since the 1993 season.