Baylor Announces Matt Powledge as New Defensive Coordinator

Baylor’s month-long (more or less) defensive coordinator search has now ended with the announcement a few minutes ago that Matt Powledge, formerly the co-DC/safeties coach at Oregon, has been hired in that role. Powledge came to Baylor in 2020 with former DC Ron Roberts and was the safeties coach in 2020 and 2021 before leaving to take that job in Oregon. He returns to what we can safely anticipate with be a DC/safeties coach role here in Waco. From Twitter:

Interestingly, though the announcement just happened, Baylor already updated Powledge’s bio on the website extensively with his hire, quotes from Aranda about that hire, and relevant information on his background. I say that is interesting because it is not something that you can do all that quickly, leading to the conclusion that this has been a done deal for a little while now that was awaiting announcement. And what was it waiting for? Well, Oregon playing its bowl game yesterday, maybe? These things are not coincidences. My guess—purely a guess—is that this was agreed to some time ago pending Oregon playing out the rest of its season. That may also explain why there hasn’t been a ton of defensive attrition yet on the current roster.

As far as the hire goes, it makes a lot of sense given what Aranda likely wants from his coaching staff. Powledge is well schooled in the defense we run and can step right into this role. He has experience coaching safeties, which we need considering we also canned our safeties coach. There are mixed reviews from various places on his recruiting ability, but we know for a fact that he took a couple of our recruits with him to Oregon when he took that job, so someone out there believes in his ability to bring talent to Waco. At just 35 years old (now don’t you feel old? I do.) he is considered an up-and-comer in the coaching ranks.

With Baylor likely filling the safeties position at the same time (through Powledge, not a second hire), it looks like we’re still in the market for an inside linebackers coach (the role that Roberts filled as DC) that can also handle special teams. We also may decide to just go with one linebackers coach and switch things around, generally, but we don’t know. Once we have more information about that, we will share. But for now, welcome back, Coach Powledge!

UPDATE: Jalen Pitre seems pleased.