rich bisaccia
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Rich Bisaccia with Jon Gruden.
After not getting a single head coaching interview this offseason, Rich Bisaccia decided to step down from his job as the special teams coordinator for the Green Bay Packers. Usually, special teams coordinators are mostly unknown, but Bisaccia became a big name after his run as the interim head coach for the Las Vegas Raiders.
Despite leading the Raiders to their only playoff appearance in the 2020s, the team decided not to promote him to the full-time head coaching job. That is what led him to the Packers. It wasn’t entirely clear why he decided to leave his job in Green Bay. He’s 65, so retirement could’ve been an option, but he didn’t say he was retiring.
It appears now that he decided to leave the Packers because he didn’t want to coach in the NFL anymore. Clemson football announced that Bisaccia has joined the program as their special teams coordinator.
This isn’t the first time he has coached at Clemson. He was the running backs coach and special teams coach for the program from 1994 to 1998. Bisaccia spent the last two decades coaching at the NFL level, so it’s a bit of a surprise to see him go back to college.
Bisaccia Excited to Return to Clemson
Bisaccia is an old-school coach, so perhaps the allure of coaching young and hungry players is more exciting than coaching the older, more professional NFL players. This will likely end any chance he has at getting a head coaching job in the NFL.
It was unlikely to begin with, and that could be why he decided to go back to college. Regardless, he’s very excited to return to Clemson.
“I am really excited to have the opportunity to work with the young men in the Clemson Football program and be part of a tremendous staff,” Bisaccia said in a statement. “After I made the decision to move in a new direction, Coach Swinney approached me with the opportunity to come back to a place that holds special meaning for me and my family. I’m thrilled to be able to return to the Clemson community and serve this program in any way I can.”
Dabo Swinney Praises Bisaccia
Dabo Swinney had briefly turned Clemson into a powerhouse, but the program has had a hard time in recent years. Swinney is excited about bringing in Bisaccia, and he’s hoping his NFL experience can help the football team.
“I’m super excited to add Rich Bisaccia,” Swinney said. “Obviously, he has been an NFL head coach and he’s been in the NFL a long time, but he also has really good college experience, in particular in the 90s here at Clemson, a place he’s always loved.
“I’ve gotten to know him over the years, and we’ve actually talked a couple of different times about the possibility of him joining our staff. It just never really could work out from a timing standpoint or because the way the rules were set up in college. But with the changing of the rules to allow everybody to coach on the field and where he was in his career, he really wanted to finish here at Clemson. I’m super excited it worked out for us too, because this is as good a special teams coach as there has been in the NFL for a long, long time.”