Hidden Figures: Seth Ryan's disappointment has transformed into appreciation after offseason role change

Note: This is the fourth installment in a multi-part series that explores the background, responsibilities, and aspirations of the Detroit Lions’ lower-level assistant coaches. Today, we’re looking at assistant tight ends coach Seth Ryan.

Allen Park — The last two times Seth Ryan believed he was ready to take the next step in his coaching career, he’s been told, “No, not yet.”

The first time, shortly after he arrived in Detroit as an assistant receivers coach in 2021, Ryan said it to himself. He admits he had felt differently when he accepted the job, having led a veteran room in an interim capacity with the Los Angeles Chargers. However, it didn’t take long for Ryan to recognize how much he still had to learn.

“When I came here, I got a rude awakening,” he said. “I was like, I am not ready. I'm not at the level that Dan Campbell requires and Ben Johnson requires to be a position coach."

This offseason, Ryan was told no again, directly by Campbell this time. The receiver coaching position opened up after Antwaan Randle El followed Johnson to Chicago. Ryan interviewed, but Campbell opted to shift assistant head coach Scottie Montgomery from running backs to receivers instead.

Ryan couldn’t argue the decision. There are not many coaches on staff with a stronger resume. Of course, losing to someone more qualified didn’t lessen the sting. However, Campbell’s follow-up offer to change Ryan’s role did.

Ryan, 31, is a third-generation coach. His dad, Rex, coached the Jets and Bills. His grandfather, Buddy, led the Eagles and Cardinals. Uncle Rob, a former NFL defensive coordinator, is still going strong as a member of USC’s defensive staff.

Seth Ryan is aiming to add to his family’s legacy. He might be the black sheep — an offensive coach among a group of defensive minds — but he has ambitions to be a coordinator and eventually a head coach, just like dad and grandfather.

And Campbell, who values what Ryan has added to his staff, wants to help him reach those goals. So instead of leaving the young assistant in his current role under someone else, Campbell moved Ryan to the tight end room, partnering him with the incoming Tyler Roehl, who is getting his first taste of the NFL after spending the first several years of his career coaching college.

The way Campbell saw it, it would be a challenge outside Ryan’s comfort zone. Importantly, it would offer an opportunity to work with a position more broadly involved in the offense.

“He's looking at my future,” Ryan said. “He's like, I see you becoming this, and I know this will help you. And there's got to be a lot of trust with your head coach. This is my fifth season with him. I trust the man completely. He knows exactly how to help his staff, how to help the team. He's helped my career a ton, so I'm going to trust him.”

The value of a name

As a child, Ryan dreamed of playing in the NFL. That’s not uncommon, but few kids get to grow up around the game like he did. Reality set in while in high school, maybe before, and going into the family business quickly became the more viable option.

Still, Ryan was in no rush to hang up the cleats. Without a scholarship offer, he looked for walk-on opportunities with a big program, ultimately choosing to go to Clemson.

“I wanted to be around a place where football mattered,” Ryan said. “So that's why I wanted to go to the south. I wanted to be around the best coaches, the best players. I want to be around the best. I felt like that was going to help me prepare the most for my next step, which I knew was going to be coaching.”

A defensive player in high school, Ryan wasn’t athletic enough to play on that side of the ball for the Tigers. He was converted to receiver — not that he was going to see the field much that way, either. The list of receivers he overlapped with at the program is ridiculous. Ryan played with DeAndre Hopkins, Sammy Watkins, Martavis Bryant, Mike Williams, Hunter Renfroe and Adam Humphries. Those were some dudes, and each of them made it to the NFL.

Ryan, meanwhile, caught five passes. That wasn't his freshman output. No, that was for his college career. His primary role was as the holder on kicks. But he still got everything he hoped for out of his football education, including a national championship.

Critically, when he was entering his senior year, coach Dabo Sweeney and offensive coordinator Jeff Scott effectively transitioned Ryan into a player-coach role to help a talented crop of incoming freshmen acclimate.

“Sweeney told me straight up, ‘Look, man, you're not going to play in the NFL.’ I'm like, ‘Thank you, but I know.’ And he's like, ‘But you'll coach there.’ And so I treated my senior year kind of like my first kind of year in coaching.

“I was still playing, still taking (practice) reps off the guys during the season, whatever I could do to help, but I was spending a lot of time trying to help teach some of the younger freshmen as best I could,” Ryan said. “It would be things like, ‘Hey, you're getting this coverage, this is how you run the route, this is how your stem should be.’ That helped our coaches. That helped them develop guys a little bit quicker. That was kind of what I was trying to do.”

From Clemson to Detroit

It wasn’t always easy being Rex Ryan’s son. In high school, Seth remembers answering the door for a pizza delivery and being bombarded by a television crew waiting for his dad outside the home.

Even now, there is the existential feeling of having to live up to his family’s name. Not that Seth runs from that. In fact, he admits he probably wouldn’t have a job in the NFL if it weren’t for being a Ryan.

He certainly wouldn’t have gotten his foot in the door so quickly.

Two weeks after capping his college career with a National Championship, Ryan got a call from Anthony Lynn. A former offensive coordinator under his dad, Lynn had been hired as the head coach of the Chargers. He wanted to bring the younger Ryan into the fold as a coaching intern in 2017.

Ryan jumped at the opportunity. He and his girlfriend packed up and flew across the country to begin his coaching journey.

“A-Lynn wanted me to just float both sides of the ball,” Ryan said. “Just help where you can, whatever it is, breaking up film, drawing cards, typing scripts, whatever it is, just be available for both sides. I was just observing, really, for the first year.”

The next year, Ryan became a full-time staffer with the Chargers, in the same role he initially held in Detroit, assistant wide receivers coach. There, he reconnected with former teammate Mike Williams, and a young veteran receiver just coming into his own, Keenan Allen.

Ryan stayed in the role through the 2020 season, taking over the room midway through that campaign, when receivers coach Phil McGeoghan had to step away to address a personal matter.

When Lynn got fired at the end of that season, Ryan found himself out of work, too. He didn’t want to bank on his dad again. After using that card to get his foot in the door, the younger Ryan needed to carve his own path.

“He already got me in,” Ryan said. “He's done. I don't want to use him anymore. I don't want to use it ever again because I want to make my own way.

“I don't want to dissociate my name, but I'm my own guy,” Ryan said. “If you meet me, the biggest comment you can give me is, I never knew your dad was Rex Ryan.”

As it turns out, Lynn would be out of work for fewer than three weeks, getting hired as Campbell’s initial offensive coordinator in Detroit. And with some autonomy to construct an offensive staff, Lynn sought to bring Ryan to Detroit with him.

Embracing discomfort

Lynn only lasted a year with the Lions. The hire proved to be a bad fit, which happens all the time around the league. He lost his play-calling duties in the middle of the season, and the sides parted ways at the end of the campaign, clearing the path for Ben Johnson’s promotion.

Ryan stayed on staff and got new responsiblities. One of the early projects Johnson assigned him was a deep dive into the trick plays run around the league. Ryan cataloged more than 4,000 for the coordinator, serving an intergral role in what became a calling card during Johnson’s tenure in Detroit.

Ryan also committed countless hours to the betterment of Detroit’s receivers, a young group that included Amon-Ra St. Brown and Jameson Williams. One way Ryan contributed was a successful strategy he learned working with the Chargers, building cut-ups of elite wide receivers running the routes and plays the team was asking of its roster.

“I always try to save all of our guys' routes, try to grab all of our top receivers in the league that year, grab all their routes and save it because, you know, somebody might need to see a route,” Ryan said. “Like, ‘Hey, this is how (Justin) Jefferson ran that route. And here's a look. Here's when you get it.

“If I can help in any way, I will,” Ryan said. "Whatever it is. If I had two more hours to watch more tape just to help a guy with one route, I'll do it.”

The switch to tight ends has been like having to earn a graduate degree in a few months for Ryan. He played receiver, he coached receiver, but he’s never put his hand in the dirt or coached someone who has. However, the day he accepted the role, he made a promise to Campbell.

“I was like, I'm going to know everything on that field,” Ryan said. “I'm going to know what the protections are, know all the run game, where they're supposed to be, the defense, how the front sets,” Ryan said. “I spent this whole offseason just asking 5,000 questions to (offensive line ocach) Hank Fraley, 5,000 questions to Tyler Roehl.”

Roehl said he and Ryan have been valuable to each other. While Roehl helped fill in the knowledge gap with blocking and run schemes, Ryan has provided a better understanding of Detroit’s pass game concepts.

“Yeah, big change for him, but the most growth can come from change,” Roehl said. “…He has a wide variety of knowledge in the pass game, playing the position. Now, being able to learn this whole standpoint with the run game, and being able to marry it together, it's only going to help him so much in his coaching career. And he's doing an unbelievable job for me in the room.”

After a crash course throughout the summer, Ryan feels confident with his new responsibilities. If Roehl asks him, Ryan can run the drills or a meeting. And if Sam LaPorta or Brock Wright has a question about their footwork on a certain run, Ryan has the answer. He doesn’t have to steer the player to someone else.

“I will say it has been probably the best thing that's happened in my career, not getting a receiver coach job and getting this assistant tight end job,” Ryan said. “One of Campbell’s things is if you get comfortable, you're never going to grow. You have to be put into uncomfortable situations. You’ve got to get fed to the fire so that you can develop and grow.

“I think it's one of the things that we do here so well, and I think that's why we've been so successful,” Ryan said. “We don't try to make it super comfortable.”

In addition to his work with the tight ends, Ryan continues to study trick plays for new coordinator John Morton. There has continued to be high interest in those studies since the departure of Johnson.

“Johnny Mo is in the business that he wants to attack,” Ryan said. “He's wants to find a weakness, and, you know, if we show him here’s where they are weak. He has so far shown me that he's going to want to do it.”

Ryan also creates reports on other aspects of the upcoming opponent, including where they’ve been hit by big plays. It all extends from locating those weaknesses and mismatches to exploit."

Is Ryan where he hoped to be in his career nine years in? No, not really. Regardless, there’s a recognition that he’s right where he needs to be. More importantly, he absolutely loves what he’s doing and the people he’s getting to do it with.

When Ryan was in high school, his dad asked him, ‘Are you sure you want to live this lifestyle?’ Buddy had tried to steer Rex and Rob away from coaching. It’s a demanding job and it can be hard on your family.

“I was like, yeah, this is all I know,” Seth said. “This is what I want to do. I love what you do. I want to be a part of it. He was like, ‘OK, cool.’ And that was it.”

Since that day, Ryan has sought out opportunities to work with the best because he wants to be the best. That helped him win a national title at Clemson, where he went from walk-on to earning a scholarship.

Presently, he's nearly a decade into coaching at the highest level.

There are still things to learn, promotions to be earned and a family legacy to uphold. One thing is for sure: When the next opportunity comes, Ryan is certain he will be ready.