As the carousel of the NFL’s hiring cycle continues to spin, one participant was jettisoned off it Wednesday.
The Jacksonville Jaguars and general manager Trent Baalke have parted ways, the team announced.
Head coach Doug Pederson was fired earlier this year, but owner Shad Khan initially stood by Baalke. Now, the team will continue its search for Pederson’s replacement, while beginning one for a new GM.
“Following several discussions with Trent Baalke this week, we both arrived at the conclusion that it is in our mutual best interests to respectfully separate, effective immediately,” Jaguars owner Shad Khan said in a statement. “Trent leaves us with my deepest appreciation for his efforts over the past five seasons. Ethan Waugh will serve as interim general manager and play an important role, with others, as we continue the process of interviewing candidates to serve as our new head coach. I am deeply committed to building a winner here in Jacksonville and look forward to introducing a new head coach who will make that happen for our players and fans alike.”
Baalke’s departure comes more than two weeks after the Jaguars fired Pederson, and the timing is intriguing.
Earlier Wednesday, Tampa Bay Buccaneers offensive coordinator Liam Coen — a top candidate for the Jaguars’ open coaching job — voluntarily pulled his name from consideration for the position in Jacksonville, choosing to instead return to Tampa with a pay raise in hand.
Hours later, Baalke was out as Jaguars GM.
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The timing could be nothing more than a coincidence, but it does point to the Jaguars’ lack of direction in the last six months. Rumors regarding Pederson’s looming termination circulated for months before he was finally relieved of his duties at the conclusion of the 2024 regular season. Jacksonville curiously chose to retain Baalke, with Khan essentially pinning the blame on Pederson for the Jaguars’ on-field failures.
“I don’t want to throw the baby out with the bathwater,” Khan said on Jan. 6 when asked why he kept Baalke. “We have a lot of things that are working that can always be improved and will improve, and there are other things that are not working that need to be fixed. The coaching, that is an area that needs to be fixed now.”
Khan added then that he would collaborate with Baalke and “others within and close to our organization to hire a leader who shares my ambition and is ready to seize the extraordinary opportunity we will offer in Jacksonville.”
So far, no coach has done so. Three legitimate candidates who interviewed with Jacksonville have since taken jobs elsewhere: Ben Johnson (Chicago Bears), Aaron Glenn (New York Jets) and Coen. The Jaguars have second interviews scheduled with just two candidates: Raiders defensive coordinator Patrick Graham and former Jets coach Robert Saleh.
If ever there were a time to clear a path for a new regime to take over in Jacksonville, it’s now. Khan appears to have recognized this and acted swiftly, with the inclusion of “effective immediately” punctuating the decision emphatically.
Baalke leaves Jacksonville after five years spent in their front office, rising from director of player personnel to interim GM and eventually, permanent GM. He served in that role from 2021-24, overseeing the selection of quarterback Trevor Lawrence, his Clemson teammate Travis Etienne and a host of others that helped Jacksonville defeat the Los Angeles Chargers in the 2022 postseason before falling to the eventual Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs in the Divisional Round.
That would be the last time the Jaguars reached the playoffs under Baalke, melting down in the back half of the 2023 season to finish 9-8 and miss the postseason. A year later, they hit rock bottom, finishing 4-13.
We’ll see if the next regime can revive the Jaguars in short order.