Brian Daboll adds ‘wild guy’ Bryan Cox to staff as defensive assistant

Brian Daboll hired three-time Pro Bowl linebacker Bryan Cox on Wednesday to be the Giants’ new assistant defensive line coach. Cox, 54, hasn’t worked in the NFL since he coached the Atlanta Falcons’ defensive line from 2014-16. One source said Cox is a “wild guy” whose reputation accurately represents his coaching style, at least going back to when he last coached in the league.

Cox got into a sideline fight with Buccaneers LB Adam Hayward in 2012 while on Tampa Bay’s staff. He caught flak for humiliating Falcons players Donte Rumph and Ra’Shede Hageman on HBO’s Hard Knocks in 2014. He shoved an Arizona Cardinals scout at the NFL Combine in 2016. And the Falcons fired him three days after their Super Bowl collapse in 2016.

“I’ve been looking at some of the mistakes I made and (thinking about) what I would do differently,” Cox told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution in 2020. “One of the biggest things that I think I would come up with, when people that are supposedly close to you, but don’t feel like you’re approachable, that they can talk to you. You have to take a look at that.”

Cox’s son, Bryan Cox Jr., 27, a defensive end with the Bills, recently re-signed with Buffalo on a reserve/future contract. Schoen has started his Giants tenure by raiding the Bills’ practice squad, so any player up there is worth keeping an eye on.

The Giants signed Bills practice squad WR Austin Proehl to a reserve/future contract on Tuesday. So all four of Schoen’s signings so far have been Bills: Proehl, QB Davis Webb, P Jamie Gillan and RB Antonio Williams. Proehl is the son of former NFL wide receiver Ricky Proehl, who most recently coached the Carolina Panthers’ wide receivers from 2013-16.

The Giants also hired Kevin Wilkins as a defensive assistant. Wilkins follows Martindale from Baltimore. He’d been with the Ravens since 2015, last season in the same position.