The Green Bay Packers have a rising assistant coach in Demarcus Covington, and the league is starting to take notice. Senior NFL writer Jordan Rodrigue of The Athletic discussed one coach on every team who is going to get more attention when the season starts. For the Packers, she chose the outside linebackers, run game coordinator, and assistant coach all wrapped up into one with Covington.
Rodrigue noted that Covington might be seeing defensive coordinator attention very soon.
“Covington has also received interest for defensive coordinator openings in previous years, but may get more recognition in 2026, with curious eyes wondering how the Packersâ defense will fare both without Micah Parsons and after Parsons returns from his 2025 injury,” wrote Rodrigue.
DeMarcus Covington is the Assistant Coach to Watch for the Green Bay Packers in 2026
GettyPackers defensive line
It is notable that Covington was working under Jeff Hafley in 2025, and Jonathan Gannon came in and not only kept him, but also changed his role.
He was given the title of assistant head coach, which might have meant he was given this added role to stay under Gannon. So, the Packers might have told Gannon that they planned to retain Covington, and Gannon had to be fine with that.
If that is the case, it speaks to how highly the team thinks of Covington.
Covington Has Slowly Climbed the NFL Ranks
Surprisingly, Covington played wide receiver in college. He quickly got into coaching after graduating from Samford and was a graduate assistant at UAB. This was where he had his introduction to defense.
From 2013-14, he was a defensive graduate assistant at Ole Miss. Then, in 2015, he got his first real look into coaching at UT Martin. He served as the defensive line coach. That propelled him into a co-defensive coordinator job the following year at Eastern Illinois. He also coached the defensive line there.
Covington was a clear riser and was off to the NFL the following season. The New England Patriots hired him to be a coaching assistant the following season. He held the job from 2017-18, working under Bill Belichick.
He was promoted to the outside linebacker coach role for the 2019 season. Then, in 2020, he moved up to defensive line coach. He stayed there with the team through 2023. When Belichick moved on from the Patriots, Jerod Mayo stepped in from defensive coordinator to head coach.
He promoted Covington to defensive coordinator. However, things did not go well for Mayo, and he was fired after one year. Mike Vrabel cleaned house, which meant Covington needed a new job.
He caught on with the Packers the following year as the defensive line and run game coordinator. Covington maintained his role as run game coordinator, but Gannon will have him focus on outside linebackers more than the defensive line. He also got the assistant coach title to stay.
His career took a small detour, but appears to be right back on track as a potential playcaller for an NFL team down the road. If the Packers have a strong start to their season with Micah Parsons being healthy, people are going to point to his work with the pass rushers as a reason for the success.
This is what makes him a name to follow as the Packers enter the 2026 season.
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