Largely, the Raiders defensive line struggled last season. Specifically along the interior. Their underachieving led to the ouster of Frank Okam after just one season on the job.
Okam’s exit was official a week ago and today Ravens head coach John Harbaugh announced that outside linebackers coach Rob Leonard has been hired by the Raiders to coach their defensive line.
Leonard has coached at the NFL for the past ten seasons. He spent just one season as the outside linebackers coach in Baltimore after three seasons in Miami.
He held different coaching jobs in each of his three seasons with the Dolphins. First as linebackers coach (2019), then as assistant defensive line coach (2020), and then as outside linebackers coach (2021).
Twice in his career, Leonard coached under Raiders defensive coordinator Patrick Graham.
Graham took over as defensive line coach for the Giants in 2016 while Leonard was a defensive assistant. Then when Graham was hired as the defensive coordinator for the Dolphins in 2019, he hired Leonard to be his linebackers coach.
Now Graham had the chance to bring Leonard onto this staff again, and he took it.