NFC Notes: Josh Grizzard, Kellen Moore, Trevor Penning, Buccaneers, Saints

Buccaneers

New Buccaneers OC Josh Grizzard has never called plays before but feels he’s ready after spending time as Liam Coen’s right-hand man in Tampa and having the confidence of the players on the team’s offense.

“I would say two years ago I really started thinking like a coordinator,” Grizzard said, via Jenna Laine of ESPN. “When you’re in the booth and you’re looking at coverages and just doing your mundane [quality control] work, you start thinking, ‘Okay, what do I call next? What do I call next? What’s this situation?’ Whatever it might be. Over the last two years [I was] trying to think in that way to prepare myself for this day.”

“The continuity will remain essentially the same. What you want to do, like we did last year, is morph it to the players,” Grizzard added. “With that said, I do think you have to evolve every year because now there is a full season of tape on what we did here and now people are studying that. … There are definitely things I’ve done in my past that I want to add to it to continue to apply pressure, but again, the last thing you want is to get stagnant. So now we can take it to the next level.”

Players like QB Baker Mayfield, OT Tristan Wirfs, and veteran WR Mike Evans believe that Grizzard’s familiarity with the team and its offense will make the transition to offensive coordinator easy for him. Wirfs has even referred to Grizzard as a wizard, a catchy rhyme for their new playcaller.

“I mean Dave hadn’t called plays until Tampa, but you get used to it,” Mayfield said of Grizzard. “We were in every meeting together, so how involved he was in the game and whatnot, I know that he’s going to be a good playcaller. You can just sense that already. Cade — the weeks he stepped up when those guys were down — there’s so much that goes into that game planning and informationally and Grizz was a huge part of that. So that’s why I’m excited. He’s a guy that didn’t get a lot of credit behind the scenes last year, but he’ll get at the forefront of it.”

“Grizz knows [this system] like the back of his hand,” Wirfs said. “He’s a wizard. … He knows what to do. He knows what to call.”

“I mean, it’s going to be similar to what we’ve run,” Evans mentioned when asked about what the offense will look like next season. “We’re just trying to get it to that best in the league level. We were really good last year. We were one of the tops in the league, but we’re trying to be the best offense in the league. I think Josh can help us get there. We were very locked in and engaged when he gave those meetings. We knew what was coming on those down and distances. … It was just a breakdown in the film, and we had wrinkles to what other teams ran and beat the teams that we saw and so we had beaters off of that.”

Saints

Saints owner Gayle Benson said they wanted a candidate who was “exceptionally bright, creative and more importantly, a tremendous leader” when it came to finding the team’s next head coach and they believe they found that in Eagles’ Super Bowl-winning OC Kellen Moore.

“I believe that is exactly what we have in Moore. He has been a winner at every stage of his career, both as a player and a coach,” Benson said, via Katherine Terrell of ESPN. “As we saw this past weekend in our very own Caesars Superdome, Kellen led a creative and innovative offense in winning Super Bowl LIX.”

Moore feels that he is ready to take over as a team’s head coach given his experience with the Eagles and his transition from player to coach during his time with the Cowboys.

“Everyone likes to say it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert. That’s a famous book. Certainly, I felt like being around it for a long time led me into the opportunities that I’ve been presented,” Moore said. “I’ve been preparing for this my entire life, I feel ready. I was fortunate to be able to transition quickly from playing right into coaching in Dallas, [which] allowed me to go through that process rather quickly. I think a lot of guys in this league, they’ve gone through this journey. A lot of quarterbacks have become coaches and there’s probably a reason for it.”

“It’s about being authentic, being consistent. At the end of the day, if players feel like you’re helping them become the best version of themselves, that’s all they can ask for,” Moore said. “I think everyone respects authenticity. Being yourself. We understand that there’s challenges associated with this job,” Moore continued. “It is a leadership job first and foremost and it’s very, very important. You’re going to have to lead in a lot of different ways. You’re going to have to challenge people, you’re going to have to trust people. You’re going to have to put people in challenging situations, so we’re going to go through that.”

Former Cowboys TE Jason Witten played with Moore from 2015 to 2017 and was also coached by him in 2019. He feels that Moore is more than prepared for his new opportunity in New Orleans.

“I had some conversations with him the last couple weeks. I think he’s only evolved and grown and more equipped through his last couple years to get him ready for this situation,” Witten told ESPN. “The stage was never too big for him. You could see it early on as a backup and then even when he became a quarterback coach and then the offensive coordinator.”

Saints

Saints RG Cesar Ruiz was asked about RT Trevor Penning moving to right tackle and how he has improved as a pass and run blocker so far in his career.

“Me personally, I think Trevor’s one of the best run-blocking tackles, like in the league. I think he’s one of the best. I don’t know the rankings but he’s one of the best. Very athletic,” Ruiz told NFL analyst Ross Tucker.  “He’s just learned the position, moved from the left side to the right side. Even in pass pro, I think he improved so much in pass pro. This is my first season playing next to him. But we say to Trev, because when he was in his rookie year, second year, Trev was like ‘I’m going out here to kill people.’ And we were like, you’ve got to do it within the whistle, you’ve got to be smart with it. Now he’s figured it out. He’s like, ‘I’m going to go punish this dude and get them to throw a flag.’”