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Ben Johnson stunned Washington Commanders when he pulled name from head coach search
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- Ben Johnson stunned Washington Commanders when he pulled name from head coach search
Ben Johnson almost was the Washington Commanders head coach. Then he spurned them while their leadership team was on a plane ride to Detroit to interview him.
The Detroit Lions and Commanders have a bit of shared history as they enter Saturday night's NFL playoff game in the NFC divisional round with a trip to the conference championship game on the line. The Lions earned the No. 1 seed and the first-round bye in large part due to having the highest-scoring offense in the league, led by Johnson, the offensive coordinator.
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Johnson has been a hot commodity in head coaching searches across the league since he took over as the Lions' play-caller in 2022. Detroit has ranked in top-5 in scoring each season Johnson has been coordinator, including a league-leading 33.2 points per game in 2024.
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Teams are interested in trying to poach the offensive mastermind this year, just as the Commanders tried to do last year. Johnson was considered the favorite to fill the Commanders' head coaching vacancy last offseason but opted to pull his name out of consideration to return to the Lions because of unfinished business.
It was even reported Johnson to the Commanders as head coach was a "pretty foregone conclusion."
Detroit Lions offensive coordinator Ben Johnson reacts to a play against Buffalo Bills during the first half at Ford Field in Detroit on Sunday, Dec. 15, 2024.
The Commanders, who were flying to interview Johnson and Lions defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn at the time, pivoted and hired Dan Quinn as head coach days later at the beginning of February. The move has worked out miraculously for Washington, which went 12-5 under a first-year coach and general manager and upset the Tampa Bay Buccaneers as a wild card to set up the showdown with Detroit.
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Reports leaked in the days after Johnson turned down the Commanders, seemingly from the Washington side, in perhaps an attempt to save face. One report, from ESPN's Adam Schefter, said Johnson's "asking price spooked some teams" and a report from Sports Illustrated's Albert Breer said Johnson "didn't knock his first interview with Washington out of the park" (though the team was still on its way to interview him for a second time).
"No irony," Johnson said Wednesday when asked about the situation with the Commanders . "These guys, they have good coaches, they have good players and they've won a lot of games this year, so a very dangerous opponent and one that we're certainly not taking lightly."
Despite the rare move to pull his own name out of head coaching searches in both 2023 and 2024, Johnson remains one of the top coaching candidates in the 2025 coach hiring cycle, along with Glenn. Three teams with current coaching vacancies, the Chicago Bears , Jacksonville Jaguars and Las Vegas Raiders , virtually interviewed Johnson during the Lions' bye week .
Johnson said earlier this week he has compartmentalized the interviews to dive deep into game preparation for Washington to try to reach the ultimate goal of the Super Bowl after coming up one game short last year.
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"I'm going to stay focused on the main thing right here and that's going to be the Washington Commanders right here and now," Johnson said Wednesday. "That's what we're about. I told the head coach when we came in — he asked me about how it went this weekend. It went great. And that's the end of it."
Jared Ramsey is a sports reporter for the Detroit Free Press . Follow Jared on X @jared_ramsey22 , and email him at jramsey@freepress.com .
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This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Ben Johnson was nearly Washington Commanders head coach in 2024
