New Defensive Coordinator: Corwin Brown

by Rob on Jan 12, 2007 10:58 PM EST in Football

Irish fans have gotten what they asked for and Rick Minter has been let go from his defensive coordinator position. Consistent with the rumors from Mike Frank,New York Jets defensive back coach Corwin Brown is expected to be named the new defensive coordinator in the upcoming days. The South Bend Tribune also reported the termination of QB coach Peter Vaas.

"Two sources close to the program confirmed that Irish second-year defensive coordinator Rick Minter and quarterbacks coach Peter Vaas were both terminated Thursday."

From what we’ve heard, Vaas has moved on and will likely accept the same position for the New York Giants. While nothing is concrete, it is likely that he resigned for that position rather than was terminated from Notre Dame. Vaas will be replaced by Ron Powlus, the former Irish quarterback and current recruiting coordinator. It is thought the recruiting coordinator opening might be filled by a former player, like Powlus. Powlus is expected to be the mentor of four young quarterbacks: Evan Sharpley, Demetrius Jones, Zach Frazer, and incoming freshman Jimmy Clausen.

Who’s our new defensive coordinator? Let’s find out…

Despite being only 7 months old or so, he looks like a pretty impressive guy. This was his 3rd season as the defensive backs coach. He served the position for 2 years under Herm Edwards and was retained by new coach Eric Mangini last winter. Before his stint with the Jets, he was the special teams coordinator at UVa for 3 years. Prior to his position in Al Groh’s staff, he spent 8 years in the NFL as safety with stops in New England, New York (Jets), and Detroit. He played safety for Michigan (puke) and hails from Chicago, IL where he attended Julian High School.

His connections with Weis are many. Even though they were on the opposite sides of the ball, they coincided in both New England and New York where Weis coached with Bill Parcells. Brown has also worked with a number of coaches whom Weis is good friends, namely Mangini and Groh. Corwin Brown was also rumored to be contacted by Weis in his first search but turned down the position.

Notre Dame and Brown have not officially confirmed the hire but the Chicago Sun-Times was able to talk with one of Brown’s former coaches.

Liberty University head coach Danny Rocco, who coached with Brown as assistants at Virginia, said he had several discussions with Brown about the position prior to Brown accepting the job.

‘‘When he mentioned Notre Dame, I told him that was one of those [jobs] too, too good to not do,’’ Rocco said Friday. ‘‘When he first told me about it, I thought it was just for any job on the staff. But when he said it was for defensive coordinator, I told him it was a no-brainer.

‘‘Corwin has worked so hard for such an opportunity, and he’s certainly ready for it. This is a great, great hire by coach Charlie Weis. This is a great day for Notre Dame.’’

There isn’t a whole lot of information available on Brown, but he was rumored to become a pro defensive coordinator soon and is "head coaching material". Brown was considered for the Michigan defensive coordinator job, but was beaten out by Ron English. Brown is an energetic, young assistant who has spent time with some very good defensive coaches in his short career as a coach.

Jets on defense: The following are stats pertaining to the Jets and their ability to defend the pass:

Year	Passing defense (rank)	Completion %	Yards/game	TD’s/Int’s	Passing first downs
2006	14th	59.4%	201.4	19/16	181
2005	2nd	61.3%	172.2	17/21	151
2004	14th	58.1%	207.0	21/19	169

Compare that with this year’s Irish defense:

Year	Passing defense (rank)	Completion %	Yards/game	TD’s/Int’s	Passing first downs
2006	60th	55.5%	203.38	24/11	111

Somewhat decent numbers, although we allow an alarming large about of TD’s on defense and keep in mind we play Navy and Air Force, two predominantly rushing teams, along with a number of terrible offensive teams. Also, important to note that the Jets gave up 40+ yard plays 5, 2 (#1 in the league), and 7 times in the 3 respective years that he was there. Notre Dame doesn’t provide that statistic, but I can only wonder how many it was.

Fun fact: The Jets went 8 games this year without giving up a penalty for pass-interference. Players credit that to Brown’s teaching:

Erik Coleman, the Jets’ third-year safety, gave an assist to the practice officials for the feat the Jets pulled off of going nearly eight games this season without drawing a defensive pass-interference penalty.

The streak was snapped when safety Kerry Rhodes was called for interfering with Oakland tight end Courtney Anderson in the fourth quarter of the Jets’ 23-3 victory last Sunday. "I didn’t think it was pass interference," Rhodes said, smiling.

Corwin Brown, the Jets’ defensive backs coach, said during a chance encounter in a hallway Wednesday that he was not aware of the streak. His players are positive that his fingerprints are all over their success.

"Corwin’s been working with us on being patient and calm when the ball is in the air and just looking at the receiver," the rookie cornerback Drew Coleman said. "We call it not losing your moxie."

What does the moxie mantra cover? "Playing with a little poise instead of getting rattled when stuff goes bad and getting all out of whack," Washington said. "Just calming yourself."

Source: New York Times

NY Jets coach Eric Mangini also praised Corwin Brown on his coaching to limit pass interference penalties.

"It's a combination of things, the consistent individual work that Corwin (Brown) does with the defensive backs on hand placement, on the release of the route, on the stem on route, how to play the ball when it's underthrown, when you're beat and you get back into a position to play the ball. There are a lot of different elements of playing a deep ball or playing the receiver at the line of scrimmage. We go through those phases and constantly talk about those phases of a route and drill it, so that when it does come to the game, we can do it without very much thought."