49ers defensive coordinator emerges as Denver’s top candidate
SANTA CLARA — DeMeco Ryans’ apparent next stop after presiding over the 49ers’ defense in these playoffs: the Denver Broncos.
Ryans is the leading candidate to become the Broncos’ head coach, a source told Denver’s 9News reporter Mike Klis.
Ryans interviewed for that post last Thursday as part of a Broncos’ search that still includes three former NFL head coaches: Dan Quinn, Sean Payton and Jim Caldwell.
The four other NFL teams with coaching vacancies have expressed interest in Ryans: the Houston Texans, the Arizona Cardinals, the Indianapolis Colts and the Carolina Panthers.
Ryans cannot conduct further interviews with the Broncos or other teams until Jan. 30 if the 49ers win Sunday and advance to the Super Bowl. That obviously changes if they lose to the topseeded Eagles.
Ryans is slated to meet the media before Thursday’s practice.
Asked last week how he’s balancing his time between a job search and a playoff run, Ryans responded: “Yeah, with everything that you do as a coach, you’re trying to crunch a lot of things in. You’re trying to really dissect a lot of information in a certain manner of time, so time management is a very crucial thing to have. And I know how to make the main thing the main thing and the main thing this week is the Cowboys.”
The 49ers then beat the Cowboys 19-12 in Sunday’s divisional playoffs.
Ryans, 38, is in his second season as the 49ers’ defensive coordinator, and he’s preparing for their second straight NFC Championship Game appearance, that coming Sunday at the Philadelphia Eagles. After playing 10 seasons as a linebacker with the Texans (2006-11) and the Eagles (2012-15), Ryans entered the NFL coaching ranks with the 49ers on Kyle Shanahan’s first staff in 2017 as a quality-control coach, then linebackers coach the next three seasons.
Eagles defensive end Brandon Graham, who played with Ryans, lauded his former teammate’s ability to read the opposing offense.
“He used to call out plays behind us: ‘Hey, watch out for this,’” Graham said Wednesday. “I see the 49ers have the same type of thing. When they played the Cowboys, they were checking for certain looks, they knew what was coming, and that was DeMeco all day.”
Ryans could become the third Shanahan coordinator hired as a head coach elsewhere in as many years, following his defensive-coordinator predecessor Robert Saleh (New York Jets, 2020) and ex-offensive coordinator Mike McDaniel (Miami Dolphins, 2021).
Ryans would be the Broncos’ fourth straight first-time head coach, though the first hired under the franchise’s new ownership group of Greg Penner, Carrie Penner, Rob Walton and Condoleezza Rice. In replacing Nathaniel Hackett and joining general manager George Paton, Ryans would inherit a team that went 5-12 last season after trading for quarterback Russell Wilson, who arrived with a massive contract extension (five years, $245 million).
Ryans, on Thursday, was named the NFL’s Assistant Coach of the Year according to the Pro Football Writers of America.
The only other Niners assistant to win that award was Pete Carroll, as their 1995 defensive coordinator. Other PFWA honors went to the New York Giants’ Brian Daboll as Coach of The Year and the Eagles’ Howie Roseman as Executive of The Year.