Gerald Alexander — Defensive Passing Game Coordinator/Defensive Backs Coach
Hometown: Los Angeles, California
Career Path: played safety at Boise State from 2003-06; second-round draft pick (No. 61 overall) by Detroit in 2007; traded to Jacksonville in 2009; had stints with Carolina, Miami and the Jets; recorded four interceptions, 14 pass breakups, 2.0 sacks and 159 total tackles across 44 career games (30 starts); assisted Arkansas State in 2013; served as a graduate assistant at Washington under his college head coach, Chris Petersen, in 2014; participated in the Bill Walsh Minority Internship Program with the Titans in 2015 training camp and then coached defensive backs at Indiana State; participated in the aforementioned program with the Buccaneers in 2016 and then coached the secondary at Montana State; joined California-Berkeley as the defensive backs coach in 2017 and held that title through 2019 (also had a minority coaching internship with Miami in 2019); hired by then-Dolphins head coach Brian Flores to be Miami’s DBs coach in 2020; spent two seasons assisting the Steelers secondary in 2022-23 before joining the Raiders coaching staff to oversee safeties; returned to Pittsburgh as DBs coach in 2025.
Alexander was part of the famous Fiesta Bowl between No. 9 Boise State and No. 7 Oklahoma, a matchup pitting two future Vikings running backs against one another in 2007 first-rounder Adrian Peterson and 2009 undrafted free agent Ian Johnson. The latter received the hand-off on the iconic “Statue of Liberty” play that scored a 2-point conversion to lift the Broncos to a 43-42 victory and 13-0 record. In the third quarter of that game, Alexander nabbed an INT, raising his college pick tally to 10.
He recalled the bowl game in a 2015 Q&A article: “It was unbelievable. When you’re caught up in the moment you don’t necessarily realize how significant of a moment it is. Me being a 21-year-old kid playing in one of the greatest college football games to ever be played, you don’t really realize that at the time.”