Buccaneers lose tight ends coach to San Francisco 49ers

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have lost one of their assistant coaches, and it’s not defensive coordinator Mike Smith, who publicly promised to stay a few more years. Instead, tight ends coach Jon Embree will leave the team for the San Francisco 49ers, according to Alex Marvez of Sporting News.

According to Marvez Embree will be the 49ers new tight ends coach as well as an assistant head coach, assisting new head coach Kyle Shanahan, who lost a Super Bowl just last night as the Atlanta Falcons offensive coordinator.

Marvez is reporting Embree’s as a done deal, something that’s reinforced by the fact that Embree is no longer listed as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ tight ends coach on their official website. The Bucs could have blocked Embree’s leaving if he were still under contract (it’s unclear whether he was), but apparently feel comfortable looking for a replacement.

Embree was the Bucs’ tight ends coach since 2014, a year before Dirk Koetter joined the team — which means he initially wasn’t Koetter’s guy. That may have played a role in the Bucs’ decision to let him walk, though Embree did a decent job in Tampa.

Embree turned undrafted free agent Cameron Brate into a very productive receiving tight end, and Luke Stocker into a dominant blocker. He also got some good but very inconsistent play out of Austin Seferian-Jenkins, before the second-round pick got kicked off the team following a DUI arrest.

Meanwhile, Kyle Shanahan has apparently already put together much of his coaching staff, and it seems likely to include a few ex-Bucs. Shanahan himself used to be a quality control coach under Jon Gruden, while his new defensive backs coach Jeff Hafley (as reported by Marvez) was with the Bucs in 2013. Hopefully he’ll stay away from the rest of the Bucs’ coaching staff, though. They seem to do doing a pretty solid job.