The Los Angeles Rams fired special teams coordinator Chase Blackburn over the weekend, the first in-season firing by Sean McVay during his nine seasons with the team. The move was called “overdue” by many fans given L.A.’s many shortcomings on special teams in 2025, but it is merely just a punishment against one person by McVay unless the Rams actually improve on special teams over the rest of the season. Has anyone stopped to wonder WHY the Rams are suddenly going to get better on special teams just because Blackburn is gone?
McVay’s answer to that question is promoting assistant Ben Kotwica and hiring outside consultant Matt Harper. Perhaps that will work, but it is has been less than a year since the Denver Broncos fired Kotwica for many of the same reasons that McVay just fired Blackburn.
On January 17th, 2025, the Broncos announced that Sean Payton had fired Kotwica after two seasons with the team. Some of the takeaways you’ve probably read this week about Kotwica’s time with Denver are that the Broncos “finished top-10” in special teams both seasons by some metric and that they were one of the best punt returning teams in the league. Both true.
It is also true that Payton fired Kotwica. Fired him. Why?
Well, just like Blackburn, Kotwica’s field goal planning was put into question after the Broncos had a kick blocked against the Chiefs that cost Denver a huge divisional win.
The first was a blocked field goal as time expired Nov. 10 that preserved a Kansas City Chiefs 16-14 win over the Broncos at Arrowhead Stadium.
The Chiefs found a weakness in the Broncos’ front on a previous kick in the game and over-loaded the left side of the line. Multiple Kansas City defenders then pushed Alex Forsyth over and linebacker Leo Chenal blocked Lutz’s 35-yard attempt to end the game.
The following day Payton said it was not simply Forsyth’s fault, that “this isn’t on one player … this is on all of us. This is on us as coaches.”
A 35-yard game-winning field goal try…blocked. Does that sound like how the Rams lost to the Eagles this season?
Kotwica made a line adjustment after that and it seemed to work.
But cut to Week 17 and the Broncos lose in overtime to the Bengals 30-24. In overtime, punter Riley Dixon (formerly of the Rams) had two punts: one went 40 and one went 38, both setting up Cincinnati in easy scoring range. The first drive ended in a missed field goal but the second time the Bengals scored the game-winning touchdown.
A 12-5 Broncos team would have gone to the Texans in the wild card round instead of the Bills. Denver went to Buffalo and got blown out.
There was also a special teams gaffe against the Chargers in another late season division loss:
The second high-profile special teams mistake came before halftime of the Broncos’ Dec. 19 loss to the Los Angeles Chargers in SoFi Stadium, cornerback Tremon Smith was called for fair-catch interference when he bumped Chargers punt returner Derius Davis as the half was about to end. The Chargers elected, by rule, to take a free kick as a result of the penalty, and Los Angeles kicker Cameron Dicker then made a 57-yard field goal to end the half.
The play cut the Broncos lead to 21-13 in the game and gave the Chargers, who went on to a 34-27 win, some momentum.
Kotwica’s track record in Denver became a “when it rains, it pours” nightmare for the special teams coach in the second half of the season. All three losses in the second half of the Broncos season could point back to special teams and that’s why Kotwica is now the interim special teams coordinator of the Rams instead of retaining his position in Denver despite so much superficial statistical success over two years.
You are not just your statistical success as a special teams coach though. That unit is measured more by nuance and individual plays — did you allow a key return touchdown (as the Rams did in Week 16) or a blocked field goal or shank a critical punt? — not just “what did you rank in punt return yards?“
Kotwica is not a change of special teams in L.A. because he’s merely being promoted. He’s been on the staff all year.
Harper hasn’t, he’s the only thing representing a new voice here, but he has no noteworthy to track record to speak of and he was a coaching free agent available to be hired in December.
So should we expect Kotwica to “fix” the Rams’ special teams problems in the final two weeks of the season and playoffs? That’s probably not going to happen. But perhaps the special teams players will see what happened to Blackburn and realize that if they don’t do better in the next two weeks, they know what will happen to their contracts sooner or later.
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