SEATTLE – Ryan Grubb is headed back home — sort of.
Multiple reports stated Sunday that Grubb will become the new offensive coordinator for the University of Alabama, reuniting him with Kalen DeBoer, with whom he worked for two years in the same position at the University of Washington.
Grubb briefly accompanied DeBoer to Alabama a year ago when DeBoer left UW to become the new head coach of the Crimson Tide in the wake of leading the Huskies to a 14-1 record and a berth in the college football national championship game, which they lost to Michigan 34-13.
Grubb’s stay in Alabama didn’t last long, though, as he then was named as the OC of the Seahawks on Feb. 13 to join first-year head coach Mike Macdonald
But after a rocky season with the Seahawks, Grubb was fired Jan. 6 by Macdonald.
Now, almost four weeks after that announcement, Grubb is back as DeBoer’s right-hand man.
Alabama surprisingly struggled this season in DeBoer’s first year replacing Nick Saban, going 9-4 and not qualifying for the College Football Playoff and ranking 22nd in points scored despite the presence of quarterback Jalen Milroe.
That helped fuel rumors that began the minute Grubb was fired by the Seahawks that he could reunite with DeBoer, with whom he first began working in 2007.
DeBoer addressed those rumors to reporters while attending the Senior Bowl earlier this past week. “We go way back,’’ he was quoted as saying Tuesday of Grubb. “Great friend of mine. I think the world of him as a football coach and obviously as a person, too. I know he is working through his process just after what last season brought. Just kind of see what he does there. Here for him whenever he needs me, and that’s always going to be the case.”
One question now is what happens to Nick Sheridan, who had also been at UW with DeBoer as tight ends coach and followed him to Alabama.
Sheridan was initially expected to be an offensive position coach but was then named as offensive coordinator after Grubb left for Seattle.
A report from ESPN Sunday stated that Sheridan is expected to stay on Alabama’s staff but it was not clear in what capacity.
There was no immediate official announcement from the school clarifying the move.
Grubb left Alabama after just a few weeks to become Seattle’s OC, saying he was lured in part to challenge himself at the NFL level, and also due to having built a relationship with Macdonald over the previous year — the two had first met at the NFL combine a year before.
“I knew this is what ultimately I wanted to do if the right situation came up,’’ Grubb said then of joining the Seahawks. “The timing is so difficult to really describe, so I think that was the hardest part, being in that position where the timing wasn’t going to be perfect. And I think in this industry, the people that are in it, you just know that the timing’s never going to be perfect, so best possible scenario, you’d love those timelines to marry up a little bit better. And obviously that was the hardest part honestly. We knew this day would come for sure, and I’m excited for Kalen [DeBoer], and I know he is going to do a phenomenal job down in Alabama and I know he is excited for me for this opportunity.”
Grubb has not spoken publicly since his firing.
Grubb was fired after a season in which the Seahawks finished 18th in the NFL in points scored after ranking 17th in 2021, and were 14th in yards compared to 21st in 2023.
Seattle also struggled to run the ball under Grubb, finishing 28th in yards.
Macdonald, though, indicated the move to fire Grubb was about more than just stats, stating: “It’s not like we [Grubb] weren’t together on this thing, the whole ride of the way. We just decided it was the right decision to make and there’s some specifics that I will leave that to Ryan and I’s conversations today and throughout the season. But we want to mirror our football team. All the things we’ve been talking about, we felt it isn’t that we weren’t doing these things on offense throughout the year. We’ve done a lot of great things, but we want our offense to be a physical unit and dictate terms of the defense, play complementary football and get the ball to our playmakers frequently and in space, and let our quarterback play fast. So we were doing a lot of those things offensively, just decided to go in a different direction.”
Seattle a week ago hired Klint Kubiak, who spent the 2024 season as the OC of the Saints, as the new offensive coordinator for the Seahawks to replace Grubb.