After 50 years of coaching, Dean Pees announces retirement

The highlights of his career include working for seven college programs and four professional teams, being one of eight defensive coordinators in NFL history to coach in a Super Bowl with two different teams (New England and Balitmore), as well as coaching alongside men like Lou Holtz, Nick Saban, Gary Pinkel and Bill Belichick. Then, there are the coaches Pees – himself – had a hand in bringing up.

At the start of the 2022 season, there had been 12 defensive coordinators in the NFL who had worked on Pees’ staff at some time or another.

Current: Josh Boyer (Miami) | Patrick Graham (Vegas) | Don Martindale (Giants) | Leslie Frazier (Buffalo) | Steve Spagnuolo (Kansas City) | Teryl Austin (Pittsburgh) | Shane Bowen (Tennessee) | Mike Macdonald (Baltimore)

Past: Matt Eberflus (former Indy defensive coordinator, now the head coach of Chicago; played and coached for Pees) | Joe Cullen (Jacksonville defensive coordinator, not retained after Urban Meyer was let go, but now with the Chiefs) | Todd Grantham (former Cleveland defensive coordinator, now coaching at college level) | Ted Monachino (former Indy defensive coordinator, now OLBs coach with Falcons)

If you expand that list to include coaches who have gone on to be defensive coordinators at the college level the total increases to 20. Then, if you change the parameters a bit, the number jumps even higher if you include former players like John Harbaugh and Mike Vrabel (which you should seeing as both NFL head coaches played for Pees).