{"id":715023,"date":"2026-01-29T22:39:20","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T22:39:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/715023\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T22:39:20","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T22:39:20","slug":"washington-commanders-defensive-coach-joins-pittsburgh-steelers-staff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/715023\/","title":{"rendered":"Washington Commanders defensive coach joins Pittsburgh Steelers staff"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">The Washington Commanders fired defensive coordinator Joe Whitt Jr and replaced him with Minnesota Vikings <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hogshaven.com\/washington-commanders-news\/399685\/washington-commanders-have-hired-joe-whitts-replacement-at-defensive-coordinator\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">DBs coach\/passing game coordinator Daronte Jones<\/a>. Whitt had his playcalling duties stripped, and head coach Dan Quinn took over for the remainder of the season. There are a lot of questions about Jones, who hasn\u2019t called plays in the NFL, and what his new coaching staff will look like.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Jason Simmons joined the Commanders after Quinn and Whitt were hired in 2024 as the defensive pass game coordinator. He interviewed with the Pittsburgh Steelers for their open defensive coordinator job under new head coach Mike McCarthy. That job went to former Las Vegas Raiders DC Patrick Graham, but Simmons will be joining his new coaching staff in Pittsburgh where he played safety for four seasons(1998-2001 Simmons is the first assistant coach to exit, but there will likely be a lot more changes on both sides of the ball with two new coordinators.<\/p>\n<p>Commanders current defensive coaches<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Defensive Coordinator &#8211; Daronte Jones<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Senior defensive assistant &#8211; John Pagano<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Defensive backs &#8211; Tommy Donatell<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Assistant DBs &#8211; William Gay<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Linebackers &#8211; Ken Norton Jr<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Assistant LBs\/Pass rush specialist<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Defensive line &#8211; Darryl Tapp<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Assistant defensive line &#8211; Sharrif Floyd<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Defensive quality control &#8211; George Banko<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Washington Commanders fired defensive coordinator Joe Whitt Jr and replaced him with Minnesota Vikings DBs coach\/passing game&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":715024,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2069],"tags":[427,7,6,855,111,10421,2480],"class_list":{"0":"post-715023","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-washington-commanders","8":"tag-commanders","9":"tag-football","10":"tag-nfl","11":"tag-washington","12":"tag-washington-commanders","13":"tag-washington-commanders-news","14":"tag-washingtoncommanders"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115980794029187442","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715023","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=715023"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/715023\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/715024"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=715023"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=715023"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=715023"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}