On Wednesday afternoon, just hours after his interview with the team, the Chargers announced they are hiring former safeties coach and Western Michigan defensive coordinator to call their defense for 2026 and beyond.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Leary was hired by Jim Harbaugh to his initial staff in 2024 and quickly made waves in his first season with LA. Following the trade for safety Elijah Molden, O\u2019Leary was tasked with getting him up to speed on short notice, eventually leading to a standout season that earned Molden a three-year extension with the Bolts. He also oversaw the rebound of safety Derwin James who earned his first of two back-to-back Second-Team All-Pro honors under O\u2019Leary in 2024.<\/p>\n
As the defensive coordinator for Western Michigan, his unit ended the year ranked ninth at the FBS level in points allowed per game at 17.4. The Broncos also finished 19th in total defense (305.5) after ending the prior season before his hiring ranked 108th.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Leary spent six seasons before his first Chargers stint at Notre Dame where he helped coach players such as Kyle Hamilton, Xavier Watts, and current Bolts cornerback Cam Hart.<\/p>\n
Following the announcement of his hire, current Chargers defenders Daiyan Henley, Tony Jefferson, and Molden all went on social media to express their excitement for their new defensive coordinator.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Wednesday afternoon, just hours after his interview with the team, the Chargers announced they are hiring former…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":714324,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2064],"tags":[241,7,1014,262,2453,2444,2443,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-714323","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles-chargers","8":"tag-chargers","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-los-angeles","11":"tag-los-angeles-chargers","12":"tag-los-angeles-chargers-news","13":"tag-losangeles","14":"tag-losangeleschargers","15":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115979264472838052","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/714323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=714323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/714323\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/714324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=714323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=714323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=714323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}