Flores, O'Shea discuss possibility of promotion on Patriots' coaching staff

ST. PAUL, Minn. — With the understanding Josh McDaniels and Matt Patricia are expected to move on to head coaching jobs once the Super Bowl is done, the leading in-house candidates to replace them appear to be linebackers coach Brian Flores on defense and wide receivers coach Chad O’Shea on offense.

On Monday night, reporters had its first chance to talk to the two of them about the possibility of being promoted come 2018.


“I’d say we have a lot of great coaches on our staff,” Flores said when asked about becoming New England’s next defensive coordinator. “First guy that comes to mind is Brendan Daly. Josh Boyer. Steve Belichick. DeMarcus Covington has come on this year. We have a lot of great coaches on our staff. All very well capable of taking that position if Matt chooses to leave.

“Obviously, we love Matt — he’s done a great job. He’s done a tremendous job, I should say. But again, right now, my focus is on Philly. Whatever the future holds, we’ll deal with it then.”

Flores, who interviewed for the Cardinals head coaching job, said it was “flattering” to get the call from the Arizona front office, and that interview process was “a great learning experience.”

“You work so hard for so long — this is my 14th year here. I put in a lot of hours. A lot of time. I worked on my craft. A lot of people can say they were instantly a great coach — I wasn’t. I had to work at this and I’ve gotten better year after year after year,” he said. “(But) I still don’t have all the answers. I’m trying to improve and get better. That’s kind of a hallmark of me as a coach and what kind of coach I want to be. And I’ll continue to do that. All the work I’ve put in that got me to this point, I’ll just continue to do that.”

As for O’Shea, he’s staying “in the now” and continuing to prepare for the Super Bowl.

“We do a great job of staying in the now, and that’s what we’ve done,” he said. “There’s job speculation like there is every year, and my focus has been on this game, these receivers that I’m coaching. Anything else right now would not be the right thing for me to think. I’m staying in the now and staying in the moment. It’s a great opportunity to be here. I’ve been fortunate to be around great coaches, from Billy O’Brien to Josh (McDaniels) to of course Bill (Belichick). It’s been great for my learning and great for me to be around these coaches.”

O'Shea says the fact that the Patriots have a smaller coaching staff than most teams has worked in his favor when it comes to his professional development, as well as helping strengthen the bond that's been built among them.

“We’ve taken a lot of pride in being a smaller coaching staff. We’ve really taken a lot of pride in that,” O’Shea said. “We’re a very close staff. We’ve really, I think, benefited from that. I think we’ve been able to handle adversity together well. I think we’ve been able to handle those distractions. I think being able to go through some of those distractions and go through some of that adversity has really kind of strengthened our group. It’s group that’s mentally tough and it’s a group that’s really close. And we all believe in the same thing and we are all on the same page.”