Twelve years ago, Mike Shanahan’s Washington coaching staff contained five assistants who’d earn future NFL head-coaching jobs. It also contained Aubrey Pleasant, then an offensive quality control assistant and now Sean McVay’s assistant head coach in Los Angeles.
And because the year was 2013, Pleasant entered NFL coaching on a ground floor much different than the lower levels are today. According to senior NFL writer Mike Sando, quality-control coaches – the sleepless, low-paid grinders who broke down film that fueled Tuesday game plans — were fewer in number back then. Young assistants like Pleasant, Kevin Stefanski and Mike McDaniel also didn’t have Pro Football Focus to provide priceless efficiency.
“I got in right before it flipped over,” Pleasant told Sando. “You couldn’t get to PFF and figure it out. I felt like I was part of the rotary phone booth in football.
“You had to sit there and look at film and figure out off the play-by-play roster, ‘Was that a tight end? Was that a receiver? OK, that tells you it’s 12 personnel.’ You’d be looking for, ‘This dude had roll-up shirts, this dude wore a black visor, this dude wore gloves.’”
Not anymore. Quality-control coaches are PFF experts who can quickly sort film and data over more than 100 categories. Performing duties that once took Pleasant hours of caffeine-induced insomnia now takes minutes. But Pleasant sees advantages in his early coaching development.
“Having to look at the film to figure out the difference between trap, gap and power builds a different type of coach,” he said.
Pleasant took a unique road to his current post in Woodland Hills, where he serves as pass game coordinator in addition to his assistant head coach title. A high-school running back, he transitioned to safety at Wisconsin. He launched his NFL career in the Redskins’ offensive offices, where he worked with McVay, McDaniel, Kyle Shanahan and Matt LaFleur. The next season, 2014, he worked with Raheem Morris and Washington’s defensive coaches.
When a 30-year-old McVay brought Pleasant to Los Angeles in 2017, he got his first role coaching a position as the Rams’ cornerbacks coach. And after stints with the Lions (2021-22) and Packers (2022), he returned to McVay’s staff in 2023. Pleasant, who interviewed for Jacksonville’s defensive coordinator vacancy in January with McVay coaching branch Liam Coen, has always demonstrated a work ethic McVay has respected.
“You can’t really supplement experience, but you can accelerate experience with hard work,” McVay told Sando. “If you want to immerse yourself in this, I would venture to say that you can get two or three years’ worth of experience in a year.”
Pleasant’s experience led McVay to tap him as the Rams’ interim head coach for a preseason game against the Chargers last August. And if the Rams can continue their defensive success, expect Pleasant to become a coordinator or even head coach in the near future.