The secrets behind Sean McVays booming NFL

Sean McVay never stops teaching his coaches — even after they depart his workers.

Last season, during a bye week following the Rams’ rout of the Jacksonville Jaguars in London, McVay recommended Jaguars coach Liam Coen.

“How to reset,” Coen said. “How to have a little more grace for yourself and your players.”

As McVay prepares for his tenth season, his affect and growing teaching tree will once again populate the NFL.

Five former Rams assistants are head coaches: Green Bay’s Matt LaFleur, Cincinnati’s Zac Taylor, Minnesota’s Kevin O’Connell, Arizona’s Mike LaFleur and Coen.

Former Chargers coach Brandon Staley and former Atlanta coach Raheem Morris — now defensive coordinators with New Orleans and San Francisco, respectively — also parlayed stints with McVay into head teaching alternatives.

“The development of the coaches who have worked for him — that’s not an accident,” O’Connell said. “That is something he’s purposeful about, and that he genuinely does care about.”

As always, McVay is fast to acknowledge the early NFL alternatives he was afforded and the teachings discovered from his grandfather, John McVay, and the Gruden and Shanahan households.

“What I would hope is that the most helpful thing for them is that they get exposed to everything,” McVay said of serving to assistants develop into head coaches. “Because I try to be as inclusive as possible, so when they get that role, they’ve kind of been in a lot of those scenarios already because they’re helping me navigate those things.”

Matt LaFleur said he knew McVay would develop into an NFL head coach within 10 minutes of McVay interviewing for a high quality control job with Washington in 2010.

Seven years later, after the Rams made the then-30-year-old McVay the youngest head coach in trendy NFL historical past, McVay employed LaFleur as offensive coordinator. To that level, LaFleur said, changing into an NFL head coach himself was not at the forefront of his thoughts.

“It wasn’t until I was with Sean and you got kind of a front-row seat,” LaFleur said. “That was a huge learning experience for me, just being so close to Sean and seeing all the stuff he had to deal with. That’s where it kind of intrigued me and piqued my interest.”

After the 2017 season, and the Rams’ first playoff look since 2004, LaFleur interviewed to develop into the Tennessee Titans’ head coach. The Titans in the end employed him as offensive coordinator and playcaller.

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In 2019, the Packers employed LaFleur as head coach, and he has since guided groups to 5 playoff appearances and two NFC championship video games.

Taylor also was a member of the Rams’ 2017 workers as an assistant receivers coach. The next season, he coached quarterbacks.

McVay empowers all coaches, said Taylor, who had earlier expertise as a coordinator. Taylor’s initial position with the Rams was a step back, but McVay and other workers members didn’t make it really feel like one.

A month after the Packers employed LaFleur, the Bengals employed Taylor. Two years later, Taylor guided his staff to a matchup against the Rams in Super Bowl LVI.

“Sean just shows you this is the model you can follow that works well,” Taylor said. “You take it to your own place, you tweak it. And certainly, over eight years, tweaked it drastically. … But I think there’s just belief when you work there, that this is something you can model off of and win championships with.”

The Chargers employed Staley after the 2020 season. The Chargers requested to interview O’Connell to develop into offensive coordinator and playcaller, but McVay blocked it, citing it as a lateral transfer.

“He had different plans,” O’Connell said, “and he’s entitled to do that. But he followed that up with: ‘We’re going to go get Matthew Stafford, we’re going to win a Super Bowl, and you’re going to become a head coach.’

“When all three of those things became true a little over a year later — I love him to death, and I would love to not give him that kind of credit. But I absolutely need to.”

The Vikings employed O’Connell after McVay led the Rams to their Super Bowl victory.

Rams coach Sean McVay, left, and Minnesota Vikings coach Kevin O’Connell greet one another after a sport at SoFi Stadium in October 2024.

(Kyusung Gong / Associated Press)

“There were countless times where he brought me into his office for circumstances that went beyond the role of a coordinator — to really pull back the curtain and let me understand,” O’Connell said, including, “He wanted to help my development, and that’s something I’ve now taken very seriously with some of the coaches who have coached for me.”

Coen joined the Rams’ workers in 2018 as an assistant broad receivers coach. He left in 2021 to develop into Kentucky’s offensive coordinator, but returned to the Rams in 2022 as offensive coordinator.

The Rams suffered the worst Super Bowl hangover in NFL historical past, and Coen returned to Kentucky before changing into the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ offensive coordinator. The Jaguars employed him in January 2025.

Coen said the teachings he discovered from McVay in 2022, when accidents decimated the Rams’ roster, had been among the most invaluable.

“He challenges every aspect of who you are as a coach,” Coen said.

Coen and McVay talked for close to three hours in the times after the Rams despatched the Jaguars to a loss that dropped their report to 4-3. Coen then led his staff to 9 victories in their last 10 video games en route to the playoffs.

“He mentioned something like, ‘Look, you can get frustrated with jersey number X or Y, but we still need to love the name on the back,’” Coen said. “And that was helpful for me because sometimes you can get caught up in the assignment and the execution that you forget, ‘Man, like I really care about that player. His last name, that means something to me as a coach,’ and to lean into that and to make sure that when you come in the building every day and your players come in the building every day, they genuinely want to be there.”

Jacksonville Jaguars coach Liam Coen stands on the sideline during a preseason sport against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Aug. 28.

(Parker S. Freedman / Getty Images)

The Falcons employed Morris in 2024, and the Cardinals last February made Mike LaFleur, Matt’s youthful brother, a head coach for the first time.

During three seasons as the Rams’ offensive coordinator, Mike LaFleur said McVay established strong foundations but also used his tireless vitality to encourage assistants to tear down tried-and-true ideas and construct them back, sparking innovation.

“It’s long, it’s tiring, but it’s necessary,” LaFleur said, including that classes discovered from McVay have served him and others effectively.

”You look at Kevin [O’Connell], you look at my brother, I do assume you just form of naturally take that with you.

“And in my opinion, it just gives you a leg up.”

McVay laments, normally lightheartedly, the loss of workers members that have ascended to develop into head coaches.

But said he was grateful for the chance to help them obtain their objectives.

And there may be an added benefit.

“What I think has been really cool is that if you are fortunate to see guys go on and do well, it attracts really high-level coaches as well,” McVay said. “When you show that you’re willing to invest in people, there’s really good coaches that become available on a year-to-year basis.”

First-year offensive coordinator Nate Scheelhaase, a Rams assistant since 2024, seems on monitor to be the next head coach from McVay’s workers. During the offseason, a number of groups interviewed Scheelhaase for head teaching vacancies.

If this season performs out as anticipated — the Rams are favorites to win the Super Bowl — McVay’s tree seemingly may have another department.

Staff author Sam Farmer contributed to this story.