The Rams continued their head coaching search over the weekend, reportedly meeting with Bills interim head coach Anthony Lynn. Prior to his promotion to interim head coach for the final game of the 2016 season, Lynn was Buffalo's offensive coordinator. Here are a few nuggets to know about him.
1) Guided Bills to No. 1 rushing attack in 2016
Lynn has spent the vast majority of his NFL coaching career as a running backs coach, but this year had a chance to be an offensive coordinator for the first time. After the Bills began the season 0-2, Buffalo dismissed Greg Roman and promoted Lynn. With Lynn at the helm, Buffalo finished No. 1 in both yards rushing and yards per rush, averaging 164.4 yards rushing per game — 14.6 yards better than No. 2 Dallas.
Running back LeSean McCoy led the charge for the club, rushing for 1,267 yards and 13 touchdowns on the season, including a 150-yard performance against the Rams in October. Buffalo had three players rush for at least 500 yards this season — McCoy, running back Mike Gilislee, and quarterback Tyrod Taylor.
Lynn took over as the Bills' interim head coach in Week 17, after Buffalo dismissed head coach Rex Ryan.
2) Long history of developing running backs
Lynn has coached for six different NFL teams, doing a nice job of producing strong running attacks wherever he's been. He got his start as a Broncos special teams assistant in the 2000 season, before becoming the Jaguars RBs coach in 2003. From there, Lynn had stints with the Cowboys (2005-2006), Browns (2007-2008), and Jets (2009-2014) before arriving in Buffalo in 2015.
Per Lynn's Bills biography, from 2009-2015, Lynn's teams rushed for 15,588 yards, which leads the league over that span. Lynn worked with Ryan for all seven of those seasons, as Ryan hired him in his first year with the Jets. At the age of 31, running back Thomas Jones had his best career season that first year with New York, rushing for 1,402 yards and 14 touchdowns, as the Jets led the league in rushing.
Going back to his work with the Browns, Lynn coached running back Jamal Lewis — who was at the tail end of his NFL career — to a pair of 1,000 yard seasons. In 2007, the Browns finished No. 10 in yards rushing, and No. 6 in rushing yards per play.
3) Lynn's a former player
Lynn spent eight seasons in the NFL as a player, coming in as an undrafted free agent with the Giants out of Texas Tech in 1992. While he didn't make New York's roster that year, he did make the Broncos in 1993 before spending the 1994 season on injured reserve after breaking his leg. Lynn spent 1995 and 1996 with the 49ers before spending the last three years of his playing career with the Broncos.
Rams Super Bowl champion defensive tackle and current sideline analyst D'Marco Farr said on the Jan. 6 episode of Between the Horns that he remembers playing against Lynn, and the name intrigues him.
"The one thing that our special teams coaches kept talking about when we played the 49ers was this guy," Farr said. "And that means a lot to me, especially when a 'teams' coach mentions your name. that means you know how to play the game. So the fact that his name has come up again — that's a guy I like.
"Now as far as being a head coach, running the entire ship, I'm not sure," Farr continued. "But when that name comes up, the discipline part definitely comes through with an Anthony Lynn."
