Packers Coach Explains Oddly-Short Stint With Bills: ‘What’s Going On?’
The Green Bay Packers hired former Boston College Eagles head coach Jeff Hafley to be their defensive coordinator on Wednesday. He brings with him a bevy of knowledge, experiences, and stories from a coaching career that spans over 20 years. He’s coached for six different schools and four NFL teams. However, he’s signed a contract with a fifth team: the Buffalo Bills. Hafley isn’t found in staff directories or record books – just a single pay stub. And yet, his idiosyncratic case isn’t etched in Buffalo lore. He told his story on “Next Up with Adam Breneman.”
In 2014, Hafley was interviewing for then-head coach Doug Marrone and the Bills, to be their defensive backs coach. Headlining the effort to bring Hafley in was defensive coordinator Mike Pettine. “I had a chance to interview for the Bills, and that interview was like two days long – watching film, drawing some stuff on the board, they were calling everybody I knew,” Hafley said. “I got the job. [Marrone] said, ‘Hey, take two weeks off, our staff’s gone, they’re on vacation.’” Meanwhile, Pettine was looking for a promotion of his own.
In that span, he was hired to be the head coach of the Cleveland Browns. The staff Hafley had met during the interview had almost entirely left to move down the shore of Lake Erie. “I don’t know anybody here. So I go to coach Marrone and I was like, ‘Coach, what’s going on?’” “Well, Pet put in for you,” Marrone told him. “Well, he wants you to come with him but you’re under contract here. I understand he interviewed you, he wanted you to be his guy on defense. If you want, you can go to Cleveland.”
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