GREEN BAY, Wis. — As newly-hired defensive coordinator Jonathan Gannon will begin to assemble his coaching staff in Green Bay, he at least knows he’ll need a new voice to lead his secondary.
Ryan Downard, who has spent the last eight seasons with the Packers in various roles, is joining the Miami Dolphins for a position on Jeff Hafley’s staff, according to KPRC2’s Aaron Wilson. Hafley was hired as the team’s next head coach last week, succeeding Mike McDaniel after coordinating the Packers’ defense for the last two years.
Downard will be the latest name venturing from Green Bay to Miami. Along with Hafley, the Dolphins also hired longtime Packers executive Jon-Eric Sullivan as their next general manager. Sullivan spent 22 years with the Packers, rising from the scouting ranks to a prominent position within the team’s front office, including spending four years as their vice president of player personnel.
Head coach Matt LaFleur was ultimately prepared to lose some of his coaching assistants to Hafley this offseason. It’s certainly possible that Hafley’s poaching isn’t finished, either—linebackers coach Sean Duggan could be next. He has worked with Hafley every year since joining Ohio State as a graduate assistant in 2019. He followed Hafley to Boston College and was hired as a defensive assistant for his staff in Green Bay in 2024.
Downard is expected to coach the Dolphins’ secondary, so it won’t be too foreign a change for him, nor will it be a promotion. It’s worth noting that Dolphins have yet to hire a defensive coordinator and Downard, who is well-respected in league circles, could be a candidate for the job in the future. Not this year, but his time is coming and he certainly has the resume for it.
Downard has been a carryover through three different defensive regimes. When Mike Pettine was hired as the Packers’ defensive coordinator in January 2018 under then-head coach Mike McCarthy, Downard was one of his first hires. He began as a defensive quality control coach before being promoted three different times in a five-year span—once to assistant defensive backs coach, once to safeties coach, then again to defensive backs coach in 2023, which is where he’s spent the last three seasons.
Pettine, Joe Barry and now Hafley have all come and gone, but Downard has been a constant on the Packers’ coaching staff. He helped oversee an All-Pro campaign for Jaire Alexander in 2020, a career resurgence for Rasul Douglas in 2021 when he registered four interceptions in as many games and a single-season high in interceptions for Rudy Ford in 2022. Since becoming the full-time defensive backs coach, the Packers have excelled at the safety position with contributions from Xavier McKinney, Evan Williams and Javon Bullard. Williams and Bullard, a pair of second-year safeties, have both blossomed while McKinney finished second in the league in interceptions in 2024.
Unless Gannon wants to outsource for a hire that he’s more acclimated with, it’s fair to suspect that Derrick Ansley is the favorite to replace Downard as the Packers’ defensive backs coach. The 44-year-old Ansley arrived in Green Bay with Hafley in 2024 and has served as the team’s passing game coordinator, but he has an extensive resume working with defensive backs. Between 2005 and 2017, Ansley was the defensive backs coach for four different collegiate programs: Huntingdon, Tennessee, Kentucky and Alabama. He entered the NFL circuit in 2018 for the same role with the then-Oakland Raiders, went back to Tennessee for two years, then returned as the Los Angeles Chargers’ defensive backs coach for 2021 and 2022. He was promoted to their defensive coordinator position in 2023.
