BREAKING: Falcons Hire New Defensive Coordinator

The Atlanta Falcons hired their next defensive coordinator for the 2025 NFL season.

New York Jets interim head coach Jeff Ulbirch / Charles LeClaire-Imagn Images

The Atlanta Falcons have hired their new defensive coordinator.

Atlanta is hiring former New York Jets defensive coordinator and interim head coach Jeff Ulbrich, according to NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero.

Ulbrich was the Falcons’ linebackers coach from 2015-20 and doubled as the team’s interim defensive coordinator in 2020 -- under then-interim head coach Raheem Morris, who's now entering his second season at the helm of the organization. Morris was on Atlanta's staff for the entirety of Ulbrich's tenure.

Beyond being co-workers, Ulbrich and Morris were friends. When Ulbrich became the Jets' interim head coach before Week 6, he called Morris while driving to the stadium earlier that week. While they were together on staff in Atlanta, Morris and Ulbrich did an offseason study together, and it helped shape Morris's philosophies on defensive body types.

"Talked about the variables of length," Morris said. "For linebackers, it was shedding off of blocks and correlated so well to what we do. Talked about from the secondary and anywhere on defense, the people that had more length, they missed less tackles. And you start to look at it.

“You just put these charts together of length, size, time, didn't matter, the height and all those things. And length became this major factor that we really fell in love with and wanted to be able to increase some of those things in those studies."

The 47-year-old Ulbrich played 10 seasons at linebacker in the NFL. This season, the Jets went 3-9 under his guidance, but his defense ranked third best in yards allowed each of the past three years after sitting in last during his first year. New York, which also ranked last in scoring in 2021, finished fourth, 12th and 20th in points allowed the past three seasons.

Before hiring Ulbrich, the Falcons completed interviews with six other candidates:

- former Cincinnati Bengals defensive coordinator Lou Anarumo

- University of Michigan defensive coordinator Don "Wink" Martindale

- former Los Angeles Chargers defensive coordinator and current Green Bay Packers pass game coordinator Derrick Ansley

- Pittsburgh Steelers secondary coach Grady Brown

- former Carolina Panthers and San Francisco 49ers defensive coordinator Steve Wilks

- former Chicago Bears head coach Matt Eberflus

Ulbrich inherits a Falcons defense that finished the 2024 season ranked No. 15 in run defense (120.6 yards allowed per game), No. 22 in pass defense (224.5 yards allowed per game), No. 23 in total defense (345.2 yards allowed per game) and No. 23 in scoring (24.9 points per game).