CLEVELAND, Ohio — Browns new defensive coordinator Mike Rutenberg will run largely the same attacking 4-3 scheme as Jim Schwartz, but the key is to rip the page from his predecessor’s playbook on how to coach premier defensive end Myles Garrett.
A 29-year NFL coaching veteran, Schwartz understood the assignment when he got the defensive coordinator job here in 2023: maximize the generational talent of Myles Garrett, who at that point admitted that he didn’t yet have Pro Football Hall of Fame credentials.
Schwartz, who’s coached some of the best pass rushers in the NFL in his career, knew what he had in Garrett and that there was plenty more meat left on the bone. He knew that job No. 1 for him was to transform Garrett into a one-man wrecking crew and elevate his game to MVP standards.
“Myles is a guy… When I was in Detroit, we always knew that every defensive plan started with how do we keep (Pro Football Hall of Fame WR) Calvin Johnson from taking this game over,” Schwartz said during his introductory press conference. “That was job one – how do we keep that? It allowed you to play it different ways. You knew they were going to do stuff to take him away.
“I think that every offense we play will probably start with that – how do we neutralize Myles Garrett and how do we keep him from wrecking this game? It’s my job to give him some answers and to be able to put some pieces scheme-wise and personnel-wise around him to allow him to be free and more productive. The bar is set really high for a good reason.”
Schwartz supplied Garrett, who turned 30 on Dec. 29, with rush-minded defensive tackles and explosive No. 2 edge rushers on the opposite side. He moved him around to find the favorable matchups, and schemed it up to clear his path to the quarterback. He had to be crafty, because Garrett was doubled, tripled or chipped on almost every play. When a defensive coordinator dared block him one-on-one, his quarterback paid the price, like New England’s Drake Maye did this season when Garrett took him down a Browns-record five times.
The results were remarkable: Garrett won NFL Defensive Player of the Year twice under Schwartz’s tutelage, and set the single-season sack record in 2025 with 23. What’s more, he nearly doubled his tackle-for-loss production to a career-high 33 in 2025, just six shy of J.J. Watt’s NFL record. In fact, in his first six seasons, he averaged only 12.8 TFLs.
Schwartz catapulted Garrett into first-ballot Hall of Fame status, with his next aim to break the sack record again with at least 25 and ultimately beat out Bruce Smith as the NFL’s all-time sack leader. Smith has 200, and Garrett is tied for 20th with 125.5, just 75 shy of topping Smith. With five years left on his $40 million a year contract, he’d need 15 sacks a year to accomplish the feat, which is completely reasonable for him.
“I don’t think I get two DPOYs without Jim,” Garrett said on the Micah Parsons podcast last week. “He helped mold my potential as a player to put me into a scheme and a system that fit me well and enabled me to do what I do best—pin my ears back, rush the passer. Attack the front. You see the front, you attack it. See ball, get ball.
“And for us as edge rushers, that’s the easiest way to play.”
After Schwartz packed up his office and left Browns headquarters the day he was passed over for the head coaching job in favor of Todd Monken, Garrett posted a photo of a fast-food worker hanging her head in despair.
The Browns, who kept him apprised of their head coach plans throughout the process, were never worried about him asking to be traded again, and he pretty much confirmed on the Parsons podcast that he’s still all-in.
“It’s about the guys we’ve got in the building,” he said. “So, we’ve all got to be pointed in the right direction. We’ve got to all understand the mission and take it with urgency.”
That should be music to the ears of Rutenberg, who inherits a group of premier defenders who are still reeling over the loss of their beloved defensive coordinator. Almost all of the Dawgs ate under Schwartz, and the quickest way to a player’s heart is to maximize his production. Schwartz also learned from one of his former colleagues, the late Gunther Cunningham how to “lay waste to a guy and then turn around and walk off the field and be laughing and hugging the guy because it was all a performance to Gun .. He was not going to pull a punch because it was a favorite player, and he was not going to be hard on a guy because he maybe did not like the guy as much. It was about performance.”
Schwartz’ players loved playing for him, and would run through a wall for him.
But Rutenberg, 44, is known as a player’s coach and should have no trouble winning over his new defenders with a mix of old-school discipline and camaraderie.
“I came into the league with a lot of athletic ability, but I wasn’t a student of the game and I was moving to a new position,” Williams [told NewYorkJets.com in 2023](https://www.newyorkjets.com/news/quincy-williams-hopes-to-take-his-game-to-another-level). “Coach Rudy was my first coach coming in, and he was just really patient with me. I just credit it to the hard work of those guys putting into me and then me just listening and taking what they said. But, I promise, they’re the ones that made me who I am basically.”
He’s also established himself in his 16 seasons as an NFL assistant as a great developer of talent.
“He does an amazing job,” Falcons defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbrich said last week. “He’s one of the best teachers in this game. He understands the back end at a Ph.D.-plus level. He’s a huge part of our success back there. Whether he gets a coordinator job this year or next, it’s coming. He’s just too good of a coach. He’s got a bright future.”
“Rudy,” as he’s known, will also have the continuity of a defensive staff that’s remaining intact. While he might not have a chance to put his own stamp on his inaugural staff, the players will keep their position coaches and enjoy a mostly seamless transition to a new coordinator, one who’s never held the position before.
And while this will be Rutenberg’s first time calling a defense, he’s already gotten firm pledges of assistance in that regard from some of his elite assistants, including linebackers coach Jason Tarver, who served as Raiders defensive coordinator from 2012-14. Despite being passed over for the defensive coordinator job — he was one of the three finalists along with Texans’ passing game coordinator Cory Undlin — Tarver is remaining in his role and will be a tremendous help to Rutenberg, who also possesses a linebacker-centric background.
But the key for Rutenberg will be to continue getting the most out of Garrett, the reigning NFL Defensive Player of the Year, and one of the greatest pass rushers of all time.
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