“Wait, which one is he?”
“Over there. With the purple hoodie. Oh no, wait. I’m not sure.”
Jesse Minter is not the tallest or biggest head coach in the NFL — far from it. At several summer practices during his first season as an NFL head coach, many media members have struggled to pick him out of the crowd of coaches and assistants scattered across the multiple fields at the Under Armour Performance Center in Owings Mills.
Eventually, Minter is spotted, calling out a defensive play or speaking with quarterback Lamar Jackson. But in taking over as the leader of the Baltimore Ravens, he has one of the largest roles to fill in the league.
The franchise quarterback is here. The dominant running back is here. The veteran left tackle is here. A half-dozen former All-Pros on the defensive side of the ball are here.
The new piece? A first-year head coach tasked with taking this talented group of players over the hump to the Super Bowl.
Minter is expected to hit the ground running with this team, without the patience given to new coaches in most circumstances. This is perhaps unfair to him, but the Ravens are set to win now, and with that comes added challenges for a young rookie head coach. How Minter handles these challenges may be the difference between a deep postseason run and a disappointing early exit.
“When you step into the shoes of a head coach, it’s a different world,” former Ravens offensive coordinator and Chicago Bears head coach Marc Trestman recently said on Glenn Clark Radio. Trestman worked on the same coaching staff as Minter with the Los Angeles Chargers in 2024. “He’s certainly well-prepared. I think he deserves time. I think he’ll grow as he now gets involved not just with one side of the ball [but] with all three sides [and] the complementary football that every head coach wants to play in some fashion, whatever that philosophy is.”
Mixing In A New Philosophy With The Old
When Minter was hired in January, a few things stood out. One, he is a defensive-minded head coach, the first in the history of a team with a storied identity of top defenses. Two, he used to be on John Harbaugh’s staff, working under him as a defensive assistant and defensive backs coach with the Ravens from 2017-2020. This shows owner Steve Bisciotti didn’t want to stray too far from the systems previously in place in Baltimore.
Minter, of course, knows this. And he will need to thread the needle of what to change in how the team operates and what to keep.
“He’s extremely emotionally intelligent,” Trestman said. “You’re not going to see a guy jumping up and down. He’s a guy who will be able to see the big picture, and see it from not just the defensive side but the offense and understanding the importance of special teams.”
Harbaugh’s in-game role as head coach was well-defined. He didn’t call plays in any phase, but he monitored the flow of the game, offered his suggestions and dealt with managing the team on and off the field.
But in the last few years, Harbaugh’s teams garnered more and more notoriety for blowing late leads, making frustrating errors and mismanaging two-minute drills and challenges, ultimately struggling to break through in the postseason. Harbaugh was let go after 18 seasons, following an 8-9 campaign without a playoff berth last year. Now, he is the head coach of the New York Giants, while his replacement in Baltimore searches for solutions to close out winnable games and find the right results in the playoffs.
Minter has already demonstrated one major change in game day operations from Harbaugh: He will call the defense, like he did as defensive coordinator with the Los Angeles Chargers the last two seasons. Calling plays as head coach, however, is a much taller task. He will need to keep an eye on everything that is happening in the game while being in lockstep with the defense every second they are on the field.
“I have a really good process, I feel, to do what I need to do to be ready to call the game but also have the ability to be the head coach and to impact the entire roster, the entire team,” Minter said during his introductory news conference in January. “I’ll make sure that it’s our offense, our defense, our special teams, and that there’s no divide there. I know I’m in charge of that.”
Minter wanting to leverage his expertise to call plays is a good first step to bringing back the team’s defensive identity. But if he misses an opportunity to throw the challenge flag or the play clock runs to zero, groans will echo through M&T Bank Stadium.
No Time To Make The Mistakes Of A Rebuilding Team
Even though Minter hasn’t been a head coach for a single game in the NFL or college, he needs to learn how to run a team on the fly, while leading one that’s built, and expects, to win now. The front office, players and fans will have little patience for mistakes common to rookie coaches.
“I’d rather be at a place where the standard is to compete and win Super Bowls than, ‘Hey, six wins this year would be a good step in the right direction,'” Minter said while a guest on the Ravens’ podcast “The Lounge” in late July.
Minter will need to know every minute detail of the NFL’s rulebook. His two-minute management at the end of halves will need to be flawless. How he schedules travel for road games, short weeks and the Week 3 trip to Brazil will need to be optimized to get the most out of his players.
For a team looking to improve to six wins, missing an opportunity to call a timeout to get an extra offensive possession would be seen as a necessary growing pain for a young coach learning the league. On this team in 2026, it could be the difference between an AFC North title and a wild-card spot.
Exacerbating this lack of experience is the collection of coordinators the Ravens have put around Minter. Offensive coordinator Declan Doyle is 30 and has one year of experience as a coordinator. Special teams coordinator Anthony Levine is 39 and in his first season as a coordinator. The elder statesman, at only 46, is Anthony Weaver, with three years of experience as defensive coordinator.
To compensate, the Ravens have added several long-practiced assistants. Dwayne Ledford is a well-respected offensive line coach and run game coordinator with more than 20 years of experience. Joe Lombardi has worked as an offensive coordinator for three teams during his 20 years of experience and will be a senior offensive assistant coach in Baltimore. And Minter’s father, Rick Minter, was brought on to work under his son as a football analyst. Rick has coached for more than 40 years, including 10 as head coach at the University of Cincinnati, and helped mold Jesse’s coaching career,
The Ravens will look to these veteran coaches to help bridge the gaps of experience, but the decision-making and play-calling will fall on Minter and his trio of young coordinators.
“I feel like I’m responsible for how the whole team plays. Whether [it’s] all three phases, the style that we play, I’m not going to micromanage every scheme in all three phases of the game,” Minter said during a recent news conference. “You hire people to do a great job. Obviously, I’m going to have more of a focus on one side of the ball, but it’s my job to get us to operate the way that we need to operate, to play the way that we need to play, to prepare the way that we need to prepare.”
A History Of Head Coaches Coming Into Super Bowl Pressure
While Minter’s situation — coming on to coach a team with immediate Super Bowl expectations — is fairly unique, there is some recent precedent of other teams with similar circumstances.
In 2009, the Indianapolis Colts promoted Jim Caldwell from assistant head coach and quarterbacks coach to head coach when Tony Dungy retired. Dungy’s Colts, led by Peyton Manning and their offensive juggernaut, averaged 12 wins during his seven seasons in charge, but they won only one Super Bowl, leading to frustration in the organization and fan base.
Caldwell stepped into a high-pressure position, and in his first season, the Colts won 14 games and went to the Super Bowl, losing to the New Orleans Saints.
Following the 2014 season, the Denver Broncos let John Fox go after four straight playoff berths, again with a team led by Manning that scored points and won games but fizzled in January.
Gary Kubiak was hired as head coach and the Broncos won the Super Bowl in his first year, despite a subpar season from Manning.
Even last season, Mike Vrabel was brought in as head coach of the New England Patriots, and they went from a four-win team the year before to 14-win AFC champions.
“[Vrabel] just believed in us. That’s really all it takes is belief,” said new Ravens safety Jaylinn Hawkins, who was on both of those Patriots teams. “When everybody thinks alike, does things alike, everybody’s on that one beat … everybody bought into that.”
As for how he thinks Minter can bring a similar leap?
“Just be himself, just be who he is,” Hawkins said. “He got picked to be the head coach for a reason. We trust and believe in him, obviously the [front office] believes in him, everybody in this facility believes in him. As long as he’s who he is, a man of his word, we all believe and trust and we’ll go on his beat.”
Getting Players To Buy In
One of the biggest obstacles for Minter will be getting his players — veterans and rookies alike — to believe his version of the Baltimore Ravens is the one that will get them to the last game of the NFL season. And how to do that is one of the hardest jobs in professional sports.
“Honestly, just the mentality that we’re trying to take, it’s a day-by-day process,” Minter said. “We’re not going to win because we’re the Ravens. We’re not going to win because we have X, Y, Z players. We’re not going to win because I’m the coach.”
“We’re going to create our success based on the standards that we create, the process that we go through every day,” he added. “How much better can we get between now and September? Then, how much better can we get between now and November, now and December, now and January, all the way through into February? So, that’s really what we’re focused on — competing with each other, making each other better, but also connecting and developing a real strong bond amongst the team.”
So far, one positive sign of player buy-in has been participation. At voluntary activities in May, the player turnout was high, and the presence of Lamar Jackson, who skipped those same workouts in other years, demonstrated a willingness to dive into Minter and his staff’s new way of doing things. That continued into mandatory minicamp and training camp, where practices have been fast, sharp and detailed.
“His style has been really good. I really appreciate what Coach is doing,” Hawkins said. “He’s really hands-on, but he’s allowing us to connect. He’s integrating into our culture, he’s making sure we’re good and he’s also buying into the players, and we’re buying into him.”
Veteran linebacker Roquan Smith is optimistic as well.
“I think Jesse is a unique individual — a brilliant mind, very cerebral,” Smith said. “[He has] seen a lot and obviously called a lot of great defenses over the years. I just think what he brings to the table, who he is as a person — I think it is just going to be good for everybody and just allow everybody to really play to the best of their ability.»
Turning Scars Into Success
What may also impact players buying in is the reality that not only is the team built to win, but many of the core players are in the back half of their careers. Mark Andrews, Calais Campbell, Marlon Humphrey, Derrick Henry, Ronnie Stanley and the newly acquired Trey Hendrickson will all be 30 or older when the season starts. Jackson will be 30 in January.
None of them has a Super Bowl ring. These players will want to be part of a winner now, not in three years.
“I think if you asked every single player in the National Football League right now, they have intentions of trying to help their team get to the Super Bowl,” Minter said. “So, this is a group that is, I would say, really hungry — not thinking about the end goal yet. I think they know that that’s what we all want to do, but [there’s] a willingness to go day by day and focus on the process and build this thing up so that when those moments happen, we’ll be at our best.”
So far in the Jackson era, the team has been consistently good, even great, but too many times they haven’t been at their best when the moment grew big. Minter’s primary job is to correct that.
“It’s great to have a bunch of guys that have been through some battles and have some scars of getting close, or having seasons where they’re way up there, and then it doesn’t happen,” he said. “So, I think all those experiences help you grow.”
Meanwhile, Minter himself will have precious few opportunities to grow. The time is now to see if these players, under Minter’s new tutelage, are up to the challenge.
Photo Credits: Kenya Allen/PressBox