Lions add former Maryland coach Edsall to staff
When he first started as head coach at UConn, Randy Edsall leaned on a young graduate assistant in the equipment room for information about his players such as who was a leader and how they treated others.
Now, that same GA - new Detroit Lions general manager Bob Quinn - is putting Edsall to work.
Quinn hired Edsall as the Lions' new director of football research and special projects today, mirroring a position Ernie Adams has held for years with the New England Patriots.
Edsall was head coach at UConn in 1999-2010 and Maryland in 2011-15. He also coached defensive backs for the Jacksonville Jaguars and worked and played at Syracuse.
Asked about Quinn in an interview with the Free Press earlier this month, Edsall called him an "extremely hard worker and a guy that I know that is a good listener and is very good at what he does."
"I kind of developed a trust and a relationship with Bob," Edsall said. "There’d be things that as a coach you’d want to know about players. How they handle the locker room, the things that they see and all that stuff. How they interact with their teammates and all that. So (he was) a guy that I knew I could trust and had a good eye for that type of character and things along those lines that we were looking for, and trying to find out that information."
It's unclear exactly what Edsall will be doing with Quinn, but Adams' position with the Patriots includes helping coach Bill Belichick with game-management situations and personnel decisions.
Quinn is close to finalizing his personnel staff for the time being after adding a new chief of staff (Kevin Anderson), vice president of administration (Matt Harriss) and scout (Ron Miles) this week.
Contact Dave Birkett at dbirkett@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @davebirkett.
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