JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – For Jaguars fans, the two joint practices between the Jaguars and Tampa Bay Buccaneers featured a lot of familiar faces wearing the opposing red and orange. The Buccaneers are riddled with personnel that have spent time in the Jaguars organization in the past.
From coaches like head coach Dirk Koetter, offensive coordinator Todd Monken, defensive coordinator Mike Smith and linebackers coach Mark Duffner, to players like linebacker Daryl Smith and punter Bryan Anger – the Buccaneers are a who’s who of former Jaguars.
But only once man with the Buccaneers can say he was both a player and a coach for the Jaguars. That man is Paul Spicer.
Spicer, currently the assistant defensive line coach for Tampa Bay, spent nine seasons with the Jaguars at defensive end on his way to recording the fourth most sacks in franchise history (28.5). After his playing career, Spicer joined the Jaguars as a coach from 2011-12, in the same position he currently holds with Tampa Bay.
For Spicer, who made his home in Jacksonville and still lives here during the offseason, the two joint practices with the Jaguars has been somewhat of a football homecoming.
“Nothing is different.” Spicer said. “It’s just familiar territory really. My wife and I still live here. Jacksonville is still out home… I’ve been here since 2000 so it was good to come home and have this opportunity.”
Spicer is still a fan favorite in Jacksonville. As we walked off the practice field during this interview, on multiple occasions, a fan would call his name and he had no problem acknowledging his former fan base.
Now Spicer has a new fan base in Tampa Bay. Entering his second season as a coach for the Bucs, Spicer is still making the transition from player to coach. He says the biggest thing he’s come to realize throughout that transition is how much time is required to be a successful coach in the NFL.
“Coaches put in more work than people get credit for,” Spicer said. “I didn’t understand that as a player. I really didn’t. Now as a coach and having been in it for a couple years, I truly see the sacrifices that coaches put in every day. We sacrifice family. As a player you used to hear that but as a player you’re sacrificing a few weeks of training camp. As coaches, we’re sacrificing a whole year sometimes putting 13-to-18 hour days making sure these players are prepared, making sure these players have all of the things they need so that on Sunday they can be the best they can be.”
One of the things that Spicer points to that has helped him make that transition from player to coach is the coaches he has been around. He says the great coaches he’s worked with have helped him to know what he needs to do and have helped him prepare the players he is coaching now.
The current crop of coaches Spicer is working with, as pointed out earlier, feature a plethora of men that Spicer played under during his time here in Jacksonville. He says having that familiarity has made his time in Tampa Bay like a Jacksonville family reunion.
“When everybody got hired and we walked into our first staff meeting, it was walking into a new staff, but not walking into a new staff because you’ve already been around them,” Spicer said.
While Spicer, as he should be, is focused on his own players, he hasn’t helped but noticed some of the new pieces that have joined the Jaguars on the defensive side of the ball. From the addition of defensive tackle Malik Jackson, to the drafting of cornerback Jalen Ramsey and linebacker Myles Jack, to the return of defensive end Dante Fowler, Spicer says the Jaguars have a lot of young talent and should be an exciting defense in the years to come.
“They’ve got a good young group of men that can really put pressure on the quarterback,” Spicer said. “I think [defensive coordinator] Todd Wash and those guys, when you’ve got some great athletes and great players that they’ve acquired over these last couple of years they should be able to go out there and really give quarterbacks a lot of fits.”
The one player the Jaguars might be counting on more than any to give quarterbacks fits is Fowler. Fowler missed all of his rookie season recovering from a torn ACL he suffered during rookie minicamp in 2015. This training camp has served as Fowler’s comeback story as he is finally poised to make his NFL debut, September 11, when the Jaguars host the Packers.
Spicer knows that Fowler has the physical tools to be a great player but says the key to his success, especially early on, will revolve around his willingness to listen and learn from his coaches and veteran-players around him.
“He needs to lean on those guys for maybe that mentorship or that leadership and they’ll be able to help him out,” Spicer said. “If he can do that, and then go out there, he can be able to just play fast.”
Spicer says the Jaguars have done a great job assembling the talent that they have entering this season. Now, he says, they have to go live up to the hype on the field.
When asked to compare the defense he played in during his time with the Jaguars to the current defensive unit, Spicer says there aren’t a lot of similarities because they play a different style of defense now with head coach Gus Bradley and Wash. However, he knows they can be great but semi-jokes that it won’t be easy to live up to the things that he was doing when he was roaming the field in the teal and black with the likes of Marcus Stroud, John Henderson, Reggie Heyward and Mike Peterson.
“We had a bigger defensive line, you know with Big John and Big Stroud, they don’t have the Twin Towers out here anymore,” Spicer said. “I think they probably have more speed on this defense than we did. I’ll give them the nudge for that. But we had a lot of experience and a lot of guys that knew what they were doing. It’s going to be up to them to see how things go.”
Follow Tim Bee on Twitter at @timbeesports
