K.C. Chiefs replace Deland McCullough with Greg Lewis on coaching staff

The K.C. Chiefs announced a series of changes to Andy Reid’s coaching staff, including some interesting shifts to fill unexpectedly open holes that could carry serious weight in the future of the staff.

Earlier this offseason, Chiefs Kingdom was mildly surprised when running backs coach Deland McCullough decided to leave the team to return back to the college ranks after only three seasons at the pro level. His former employer at Indiana University came calling with a chance to coach the same position there along with an added job title of assistant head coach, and McCullough made the decision to move back to Bloomington.

It was an interesting development for a staff that was set to play in a Super Bowl for as long as this offense remained together. On the one hand, it felt like McCullough was a young ascending coach who has been accepted into one of the NFL’s great platforms for launching future coordinators and head coaches. Certainly McCullough had even watched that mechanism at work since his arrival in 2018 when Matt Nagy left for the Chicago Bears head coaching job.

At the same time, McCullough had also watched Eric Bieniemy get passed over for the third consecutive offseason this year for head coaching opportunities, which meant the pipeline wasn’t moving since his arrival for reasons unknown. It had nothing to do with McCullough further down the food chain, but it was also clear that Bieniemy needed his chance and from there it was safe to assume that Matt Kafka would get his moment to shine as O.C. and others were vying for the same role.

The K.C. Chiefs announced a series of coaching staff changes.

When McCullough left in early February, it signaled some coaching changes that would eventually take place, and now the Chiefs have filled those roles heading into the draft season and as OTAs draw near. That means we finally learned that former wide receivers coach Greg Lewis will now be tasked with leading the running backs room as Joe Bleymaier takes on the wide receivers role. Bleymaier had previously been in an assistant QB coach role for the last three seasons.

For Lewis, his previous NFL experience along with his tenure as WR coach for the Chiefs should give him some solid experience coaching different positions that will allow him to grow even more and enhance his own resume for the steps forward. Bieniemy can’t go overlooked forever and another Super Bowl would likely generate serious movement in the pipeline—perhaps going from none hired to numerous hires next offseason.

As for other changes, the Chiefs also announced that David Girardi would slide into Bleymaier’s old role and that Connor Embree as a new offensive quality control coach. On the defensive side, Ken Flajole will take over for the departed Britt Reid as outside linebackers coach. He was the defensive coordinator for current Chiefs DC Steve Spagnuolo back in his head coaching stint with the St. Louis Rams. Terry Bradden Jr. moved from defensive QC to assistant defensive line as well. Meanwhile, Donald D’Alesio was added as a defensive assistant, and the training staff added Tyler Judkins from the Chargers.