Former Cal head coach Jeff Tedford will be Lovie Smith’s offensive coordinator in Tampa Bay.
Smith had reportedly made a deal with Tedford to hire him as his offensive coordinator whenever Smith got another NFL head-coaching gig, and Chris Mortensen of ESPN reports that the deal is now done for Tedford to be offensive coordinator of the Buccaneers.
Tedford was the head coach at Cal for 11 seasons and had a lot of success early in his tenure, particularly in 2004, when Cal was a Top 10 team and Tedford was hailed as an offensive genius. However, as Cal began to struggle later in Tedford’s time there, his critics pointed out that it was easy to look like an offensive genius when coaching that 2004 team, which had a loaded roster that included Aaron Rodgers and Marshawn Lynch.
Tedford has a great deal of experience in college football and the Canadian Football League but has never coached in the NFL. Smith, a well-regarded defensive coach whose Bears teams often struggled on offense, has to hope that Tedford has what it takes to run an offense in the NFL.