Strength coach hired by Texans

Vance Joseph will have to make at least one more hire to his coaching staff for 2018.

After six years with the Broncos, strength-and-conditioning coach Luke Richesson is headed to the Houston Texans, likely to oversee their strength program, an NFL source confirmed Friday. Richesson had one year remaining on his contract with the Broncos and was granted permission to accept the job in Houston.

In his time in Denver, Richesson helped to revamp the Broncos’ conditioning program and instilled a reliance on new technologies to monitor the players’ exertion and recovery.

To replace him, the Broncos could look in house and promote one of Richesson’s assistants — Mike Eubanks, Anthony Lomando or Cedric Smith.

Eubanks had been with Richesson since 2007, when Richesson trained college prospects at Athletes’ Performance (now EXOS) in Arizona and followed him to Jacksonville for three years before coming to Denver in 2012.

Lomando followed a similar path and had worked with Richesson since 2006, at Athletes’ Performance, Jacksonville and then Denver since 2012.

Smith joined the Broncos last year, shortly after Joseph was appointed head coach. The former NFL fullback was an assistant on the Broncos’ staff (200106) and head strength coach for the Kansas City Chiefs (200709). In 2010, he was hired to Gary Kubiak‘s staff in Houston, where he ran the Texans’ strength program for four seasons and was named the NFL strength and conditioning coach of the year in 2012.

Out of house, the Broncos could try to lure Loren Landow, the owner of Landow Performance, who is the go-to offseason trainer for many Broncos players, as well as Panthers running back Christian McCaffrey and Olympic swimmer Missy Franklin, among many others.

9News first reported Richesson’s departure from Denver.