Last year, Jim O’Neil was taking a year off from coaching. After a two-year stint as the Northwestern defensive coordinator and a dozen years of NFL positional coach experience before that, he was looking to reset and figure out his next move. He decided to drop in for a couple of Detroit Lions OTA practices to reconnect with defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn—whom he had hired back in 2014 when O’Neill was the defensive coordinator of the Cleveland Browns.
O’Neil—who was hired this offseason as the Lions’ defensive assistant and will coach the safeties this year—had never met Dan Campbell at the time.