Tennessee football: Five positives from Vols moving Brian Niedermeyer to ILB coach

2. More experience coaching defense

Building off what we said on our previous post, one of the reasons Brian Niedermeyer may not have produced the best results as Tennessee football’s tight ends coach was the fact that he had limited experience coaching the position. Although he played tight end in college, he has never had a focus on coaching that role ever since he joined the coaching ranks.

Niedermeyer coached wide receivers at the smaller levels. Then, when he joined the Georgia Bulldogs in an off-field role in 2015, he was a defensive graduate assistant. The next year, he followed Jeremy Pruitt to the Alabama Crimson Tide and once again held a role as a defensive graduate assistant. Then he became assistant director of recruiting operations in 2017.

However, even then, Niedermeyer was focusing on the defensive side of the ball. Before joining the Vols’ staff in 2018, all of his experience at the SEC level was on defense. As a result, he is in a role where he is probably more comfortable leading at this point, even if he didn’t play that position back when he was in college.

As a hard-nosed, aggressive coach, leading a defensive unit is probably a better fit for Niedermeyer. Linebacker is perfect for him, and he’s likely going to produce lots more talent in this role. Again, this move also allows Joe Osovet, who is actually experienced coaching offense, to be promoted and coach tight ends. So everybody is now leading roles they know a bit better.