Support for Jaguars coach Jack Del Rio resonated from every part of the Jaguars locker room all week and players applauded team owner Wayne Weaver's decision to keep his head coach.
"I think that's the consensus around the locker room," kicker Josh Scobee said. "The players like Jack, we like what he brings to the table. It's just a matter of executing better. They call the plays and we're supposed to execute them."
The Jaguars retained Del Rio for at least next season, his ninth in Jacksonville. Del Rio is the fourth-longest tenured coach in the NFL. He still has two seasons remaining on his contract.
Almost immediately after news of Del Rio's return surfaced, defensive tackle Terrance Knighton posted on Twitter that Del Rio is the right man for the job.
"I wouldn't wanna play for no one else," Knighton posted. "He's perfect for us. We as players need to put in the effort like Jack does. Only if people knew how hard our coaches work."
That feeling was consistent throughout the season. The first rumblings of Del Rio's job security slipping occurred in Week 4 after back-to-back 25-point losses, and back then players said they wanted Del Rio to remain head coach.
In the past few weeks, as those rumblings grew louder, especially with a late-season slide that left the Jaguars at 8-8, their third consecutive non-winning season, players echoed Del Rio's sentiments that the team had improved despite missing the playoffs again.
Players were aware of the speculation about his job status and guard Uche Nwaneri said that drove Del Rio to coach even more passionately.
"With all the talk and the negative energy coming from the outside world after we dropped two in a row, you could kind of see that weight on his shoulders," guard Uche Nwaneri said. "Jack was more than able to carry that weight."
Several players said the Jaguars were a team on the rise.
Where they failed, they blamed themselves rather than their coach.
"There's no coach out there that dictates the outcome of the game," cornerback Rashean Mathis said. "There's no one call out there that coaches make that dictate the outcome of the game. The players that are on the field, we're the guys who are making them or not making them. That's my thought process regardless of what sport you play. Phil Jackson's a great coach, but he's also had great players to help him win championships."
Their words meant something in Weaver's decision. He spoke to 10 players, veteran team leaders, to ask their thoughts on Del Rio. One player, whom Weaver did not identify, said a new head coach would be detrimental to the Jaguars.
"Especially if you're trying to build something and you're trying to re-establish the identity of this organization, it starts with the head coach," Knighton said before the decision was announced. "If you replace a coach you're basically going back to Step 1."
The Jaguars consider themselves to have just completed the second year of a rebuilding process. They replaced major parts of their defense and a few offensive pieces in the past two seasons. Weaver attributed that turnover to the Jaguars' late-season slides in the past two seasons.
"We're very close," said running back Maurice Jones-Drew, who missed the last two games with a knee injury. "We're in the divisional title game [a loss to the Colts on Dec. 19]. We made a great run, we did a lot of great things, we just didn't finish at the end. There's a lot of things we've got to take care of.
"It was a great season, we're 8-8. Half the world thought we were going to go 4-12. We just gotta continue to work hard and keep proving ourselves."
