Mike Pettine didn’t stay unemployed long. The former New York Jets defensive coordinator was not brought back in New York, announced Tuesday. One day later ESPN’s Chris Mortensen reports Pettine has signed on to join Doug Marrone’s staff in the same capacity he served at with the Jets.
Pettine has been the Jets defensive coordinator over the past four years and each season the team finished in the top eight or better in yards allowed in the league.
Ryan quipped Tuesday to reporters when asked about Pettine’s future: “I wish him all the best unless he goes to Buffalo.”
It appears Pettine isn’t coming to Buffalo alone. Manish Mehta of the New York Daily News tweets that assistant defensive backs coach Jim O’Neil will join him in Buffalo.
There is a lot to breakdown on Pettine, which will be begin to do in the coming hours. Overall I’m confident this is a hire Bills fans are going to take comfort in. Pettine is a well respected defensive coach in this league, having success not only with New York but in Baltimore previously. One thing we look forward to finding out is what Buffalo’s defensive philosophy is going to be. The Jets played a lot of 3-4 based defense, but that doesn’t mean he’ll do the same with Buffalo.
New York shifted more towards a 4-3 last season.
Pettine clearly was ready to step out of Rex Ryan’s shadow and run a defense on his own. A New York Daily News report last December 21 said Pettine turned down a contract extension from the Jets. The article said Pettine’s biggest frustration stemmed from feeling like the defense “had to pitch a shutout” every week because of how awful the Jets offense was playing.
The Bills tried to go to a 3-4 in 2010 and the two-year switch proved to be disastrous, although their statistics were equally as bad last year. Most see Buffalo as better suited for the 4-3 defense, but we’ll soon enough find out what Pettine has to say regarding that.
We’ll have plenty of more insight and opinion about Pettine throughout the next few days, hopefully from a slew of people and reporters more qualified to discuss his work and what he’ll bring to Buffalo.
