The Seahawks plan to hire Washington native Greg Olson as their new quarterbacks coach to replace Dave Canales, who left last week to become the offensive coordinator of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, a source has confirmed.
With the Seahawks, Olson — who has been on an NFL coaching staff every year but once since 2001 — will be reunited with offensive coordinator Shane Waldron and offensive line coach Andy Dickerson, having worked with each with the Rams in 2017 when he was quarterbacks coach in LA.
That was Sean McVay’s first season with the Rams when LA improved from 4-12 the year before to 11-5 and from ranking last in the NFL in points scored the year before to first. Olson that year coached Jared Goff to his breakout season when Goff led the NFL in yards per completion at 12.9.
After leaving LA to become the offensive coordinator with the Raiders from 2018-21, Olson returned to the Rams, where he spent last season as a senior offensive assistant.
Olson is a 1981 graduate of Richland High where he played quarterback for the Bombers, beating a Shadle Park team quarterbacked by future Super Bowl MVP Mark Rypien to reach the semifinals of the state playoffs in 1980 before losing to eventual state champ Mount Tahoma.
He later graduated from Central Washington and then received a master’s degree from Washington State, where he began his coaching career as a graduate assistant under Dennis Erickson and Mike Price.
His first full-time coaching job was as the offensive coordinator at Central from 1990-93 where he coached future Seahawks QB Jon Kitna.
After a stint as the QB coach with Purdue from 1997-2000 when the Boilermakers quarterback was Drew Brees, he broke into NFL coaching in 2001 with 49ers.
Olson has coached with seven different NFL franchises and has six stints as an offensive coordinator — Detroit Lions (2004-05), St. Louis Rams (2006-07), Tampa Bay (2009-11), Oakland Raiders (2013-14), Jacksonville Jaguars (2015-16), and again with the Raiders (2018-21).
Olson’s wife, Lissa Gray Olson, was a standout hurdler and high jumper at Washington State University and later coached at WSU, South Florida, Purdue and Cal.
Olson is the first addition to Seattle’s coaching staff this offseason, but two more will now be needed to replace two other coaches who have left — assistant receivers coach Brad Idzik and assistant defensive line/defensive ends coach Aaron Curry.
Idzik is leaving to join Canales in Tampa Bay and Curry is leading to become linebackers coach with the Steelers.
CBSSports.com, though, also reported that both Olson and current Seattle assistant quarterbacks coach Kerry Joseph interviewed with Tampa Bay to be the new QB coach of the Bucs. That might mean Joseph is in line to take over at Tampa Bay.