Who the 49ers will Hire to Replace Steve Wilks as Defensive Coordinator

The 49ers could replace him internally.

Grant Cohn | Feb 14, 2024

In this story:

San Francisco 49ers

The 49ers wasted no time firing defensive coordinator Steve Wilks this offseason. Here are three coaches they could hire to replace him.

1. Daniel Bullocks

Bullocks is the 49ers defensive backs coach and has been with the team since 2017 -- he's part of Kyle Shanahan's original coaching staff which included both Robert Saleh and DeMeco Ryans. Which means Bullocks helped create the defensive culture of "all gas, no breaks" which the 49ers seemed to lose at times this season. The issue with Bullocks is his lack of experience. He never has been a coordinator. Can the 49ers win a Super Bowl with a rookie play caller on defense? Shanahan might prefer someone with Super Bowl experience, while the players most likely prefer Bullocks because they know him. If Shanahan brings in an outsider, he runs the risk of his players rejecting him the way they rejected Wilks.

2. Brian Flores

Flores is a highly-respected defensive coordinator who has experience as a head coach, plus he won four Super Bowls as an assistant on the Patriots under Bill Belichick. In addition, Flores held the 49ers offense to just 17 points this season when he was the defensive coordinator for the Vikings. Flores would be a terrific addition to the 49ers, considering he has history coaching both safeties and linebackers. He could tie the defense together.

3. Mike Vrabel

Vrabel has three Super Bowls as a player, but none as a coach. Still, he was a successful head coach for the Titans who most likely will become a head coach again soon. In the meantime, he could coach the 49ers defense for a year, win a Super Bowl and hit the coaching market again next year.

Published Feb 14, 2024

GRANT COHN

Grant Cohn has covered the San Francisco 49ers daily since 2011. He spent the first nine years of his career with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat where he wrote the Inside the 49ers blog and covered famous coaches and athletes such as Jim Harbaugh, Colin Kaepernick and Patrick Willis. In 2012, Inside the 49ers won Sports Blog of the Year from the Peninsula Press Club. In 2020, Cohn joined FanNation and began writing All49ers. In addition, he created a YouTube channel which has become the go-to place on YouTube to consume 49ers content. Cohn's channel typically generates roughly 3.5 million viewers per month, while the 49ers' official YouTube channel generates roughly 1.5 million viewers per month. Cohn live streams almost every day and posts videos hourly during the football season. Cohn is committed to asking the questions that 49ers fans want answered, and providing the most honest and interactive coverage in the country. His loyalty is to the reader and the viewer, not the team or any player or coach. Cohn is a new-age multimedia journalist with an old-school mentality, because his father is Lowell Cohn, the legendary sports columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle from 1979 to 1993. The two have a live podcast every Tuesday. Grant Cohn grew up in Oakland and studied English Literature at UCLA from 2006 to 2010. He currently lives in Oakland with his wife.