Tag: Derrick Foster

Report: Cowboys to hire RB coach with ties to Alvin Kamara, Austin Ekeler

From @ToddBrock24f7: Derrick Foster served as RB coach in New Orleans for 2024 and was with the Chargers for Austin Ekeler’s three most productive seasons.

The Cowboys have made up their minds on a key member of Brian Schottenheimer’s coaching staff.

The team will hire Derrick Foster to be their running backs coach, according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram‘s Nick Harris, who cited multiple sources in a Monday midday post to X.

Foster, 38, will come to Dallas from New Orleans, where he served as RB coach this past season and helped guide Alvin Kamara to 950 rushing yards in 14 games and a yards-per-game average (67.9) that was 12th-best in the league for 2024.

He was in same position for the Chargers prior to that and was instrumental in helping Austin Ekeler deliver the three highest season yardage totals of his NFL career.

Foster had interviewed with the Cowboys last week, as had former Dallas running back Tashard Choice, currently the position coach at Texas. Oregon running backs coach and Metroplex product Ra’Shaad Samples was also reportedly on the candidate list.

Both Choice and Samples were highly regarded, though there was speculation that either would have had to take a significant pay cut to leave their premier Power Five programs to work for Jerry Jones, who has a reputation for giving budget-conscious contracts to his coaches.

Like those individuals, Foster also has extensive college experience, dating back to 2011 with stints on staff at Valdosta State, Tennessee, Northwestern State, Samford, and three seasons at Iowa before making the jump to the NFL in 2021. His role at nearly all of those stops focused on running backs.

The Cowboys will look to turn around their ground game in 2025 after a season in which they ranked 27th leaguewide in rushing yards, were third-worst in yards per carry, and had the fewest number of rushing touchdowns of any team in the NFL.

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Rico Dowdle finished the season ranked 12th in rushing yards with 1,079. He didn’t see consistent usage as the Cowboys’ lead ballcarrier until late November, though, as the team insisted on forcing a committee approach with Ezekiel Elliott for the first half of the season.

Elliott was released prior to Week 18, and Dowdle is now set to enter free agency this offseason. The Cowboys are widely expected to address the running back position in either the draft or free agency, or both.

And it will fall largely on Derrick Foster to restore the once-great Cowboys ground attack into a source of strength for the team in Schottenheimer’s first season.

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Cowboys hire running backs coach away from Saints coaching staff

The Dallas Cowboys are hiring their running backs coach away from the New Orleans Saints. It’ll be a whole new Saints coaching staff in 2025:

It’ll be a new-look New Orleans Saints coaching staff in 2025. The Fort Worth Star-Telegram’s Nick Harris reports that the Dallas Cowboys are hiring running backs Derrick Foster away from the Saints’ staff, where he held the same position in 2024. Before that, Foster spent three years coaching the Los Angeles Chargers in the same capacity.

His time with the Chargers overlapped with Kellen Moore’s, so it’s a little surprising to see Foster moving on so soon. Moore is the favorite to be hired as head coach after the Philadelphia Eagles compete in Super Bowl LIX. If Foster was a candidate to remain on staff under Moore, who can’t communicate with the team again until after the Super Bowl, you’d think he would wait a week to see if he can stay in New Orleans.

Still, change was probably needed. While Alvin Kamara turned in his best performance in years the other Saints running backs were nothing to write home about. Jamaal Williams averaged 11.7 rushing yards per game. Jordan Mims had just 6.4. Kendre Miller led the trio with 24.7. Clyde Edwards-Helaire had 23.0 but wasn’t re-signed after the season.

So whoever is coaching the Saints running backs in 2025 must get more out of them as a group. Kamara last made the Pro Bowl in 2021 but has seen increasingly heavy workloads. He’s seen the seventh-most combined carries and catches from 2022 to 2024 but ranks fourth in touches per game (19.8). The only players ahead of him are Saquon Barkley (22.1), Josh Jacobs (21.3), and Derrick Henry (20.7). Someone needs to step up, and it’ll fall on their next running backs coach to find them.

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Another Saints assistant coach could be on his way out the door soon

Another Saints assistant coach could be on their way out of town, as running backs coach Derrick Foster interviewed with the Dallas Cowboys:

Another day, another New Orleans Saints coach interviewing for a lateral position move with a new team. This time it is running backs coach Derrick Foster, who has interviewed with the Dallas Cowboys for the same position. Foster previously worked with the Los Angeles Chargers from 2021 to 2023, crossing paths with Saints head coach candidate Kellen Moore for a season before Moore moved on to the Philadelphia Eagles.

This seems like a somewhat odd move if Moore is the pick for head coach, but ultimately it seems many of the assistant coaches are being allowed to leave and find new teams if they wish. The unfortunate part is many of these are lateral moves, so they are leaving for the same job just with a different team. Foster may be added to the list of one-and-done coaches from the Saints’ 2024 staff along with offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak and maybe quarterbacks coach Andrew Janocko. They are beginning to completely wipe the slate clean for whoever the new head coach may be.

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Saints may have settled their fullback competition by waiving Zander Horvath

The Saints may have settled their fullback competition by waiving Zander Horvath. But is Adam Prentice’s job really safe from Taysom Hill?

Training camp isn’t over just yet, but the New Orleans Saints may have already settled their fullback competition. Zander Horvath was let go on Tuesday, per NewOrleans.Football’s Nick Underhill.

Horvath followed running backs coach Derrick Foster to New Orleans from the Los Angeles Chargers, and he initially seemed to have an edge over Adam Prentice, who the Saints re-signed this offseason after he tested free agency. Offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak asks a lot of his fullbacks in blocking for their teammates while also running routes and occasionally catching passes, and Prentice has emerged as a better option.

That’s a little surprising after Prentice’s rough 2023 season. He had a costly fumble and some dropped passes last year, but credit to him for stepping up in the face of competition. But he isn’t out of the woods yet. Taysom Hill has taken more snaps at fullback this summer than in the past and Prentice must convince the coaching staff they still need a full-time fullback even with Hill in the mix to a greater degree. We’ll keep an eye on him through the next two preseason games.

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Saints sign a new fullback, but he isn’t new to their coaching staff

The Saints signed a new fullback, but he isn’t new to their coaching staff. Meet Zander Horvath:

The New Orleans Saints signed a new fullback, but he isn’t new to their coaching staff. Meet Zander Horvath, formerly of Purdue, whose addition was announced on Thursday’s update to the daily NFL transactions wire.

Horvath, 25, played college football at Purdue before turning pro with the Los Angeles Chargers, who picked him in the seventh round of the 2022 NFL draft. He measured out exceptionally well in the pre-draft process with a 9.83 Relative Athletic Score (a metric which often lines up with attributes the Saints value). He weighed in at 6-foot-2 and 228 pounds but has been listed at 232 and 235 with different teams.

Former Chargers running backs coach Derrick Foster worked with him closely in L.A., so there’s an obvious connection with Foster holding the same position on staff these days in New Orleans. Horvath was waived during roster cuts last August and briefly landed with the Pittsburgh Steelers, but the Chargers brought him back to their practice squad to close out the season. He wasn’t re-signed after that.

He wasn’t the only player the Saints tried out on Thursday; the wire also reports 232-pound running back Qadree Ollison as a participant. He’s a former Atlanta Falcons draft pick (fifth round in 2019) who was teammates with Horvath on the Steelers for a few months last season. The Saints must have liked what they saw from Horvath better.

This might mean the end of the road for Adam Prentice. The incumbent Saints fullback is a restricted free agent but he’s coming off a down year with dropped passes, blown blocking assignments, and a very unfortunate fumble. Offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak is going to be asking different things of his fullback than Pete Carmichael asked of Prentice last season, so they might look for someone else to push Horvath for the job in training camp.

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Klint Kubiak-Derrick Foster pairing can maximize Saints’ running backs

The Klint Kubiak-Derrick Foster pairing should ensure Alvin Kamara and Kendre Miller’s versatility is maximized in 2024:

As the New Orleans Saints fill out the offensive coaching staff, they have closed in on Derrick Foster as their running backs coach. Foster comes over to New Orleans after three years with the Los Angeles Chargers in the same position. He’ll be working under offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak, and the pairing has the potential to elevate the running backs room.

The versatility of Alvin Kamara and Kendre Miller can be maximized by this coaching duo. In Foster’s two years in Los Angeles, running back Austin Ekeler led the league in total touchdowns (rushing and receiving). His tutelage will likely leave a larger impression on Miller as a young player, but Kamara will benefit as well from a coach familiar with using a versatile player, such as Kamara.

Kubiak has a similar level of expertise. He worked with Christian McCaffrey, this year’s leader in touchdowns, on the San Francisco 49ers. Seeing Kyle Shanahan get the most out of McCaffrey’s many talents has to have taught him some things in how to best deploy Kamara.

The combination of Kubiak installing a running back-friendly scheme and familiarity with dual-threat playmakers should help the Saints maximize the talents at the position. Expect more catches and touchdowns for both Kamara and Miller in 2024.

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Saints expected to hire former Chargers RB coach Derrick Foster

The Saints are expected to hire former Chargers running backs coach Derrick Foster, adding more youth and new insight to their coaching staff:

This could be a big get: Derrick Foster is expected to be hired as the New Orleans Saints’ new running backs coach, as first reported by Matt Zenitz of 247 Sports.

Foster, 38, spent the last three years in that position with the Los Angeles Chargers, where he helped develop Austin Ekeler into the NFL’s top scoring threat; no player scored more touchdowns (44) over the last three years put together.

Before he came to the NFL, Foster coached running backs at Iowa from 2018 to 2020 and also worked at Samford, Northwestern State in Louisiana, and Tennessee.

Now, he’ll be working with Alvin Kamara. The Saints fielded one of the league’s least-effective rushing attacks in 2023 and it falls on Foster and new offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak to get more out of their personnel; not just Kamara but also second-year pro Kendre Miller and veteran backup Jamaal Williams. They can’t rely on Taysom Hill being the team’s most explosive runner again in 2024.

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Report: Chargers expected to hire Derrick Foster as running backs coach

The Los Angeles Chargers will have a new running backs coach.

The Chargers coaching staff is nearly complete.

According to AL.com’s Matt Zenitz, Los Angeles is expected to hire former Iowa running backs coach Derrick Foster in the same role.

Hired back in 2018, Foster led a running back group that included first-team All-Big Ten running back Tyler Goodson this past season.

Foster served as running backs coach and running game coordinator at Samford University in 2015 and 2016.

He has also coached wide receivers and running backs at Tennessee, Northwestern State University, and Valdosta State University.