Getty Team Irvin acting head coach Winston Moss of the Green Bay Packers walks back to the sidelines during the second half of the 2016 NFL Pro Bowl at Aloha Stadium on January 31, 2016 in Honolulu, Hawaii.Team Irvin defeated Team Rice 49-27.
Apparently, Winston Moss isn’t messing around when it comes to his XFL team.
Moss, who spent more than a decade as a Green Bay Packers coach and is now both head coach and general manager of the Los Angeles Wildcats, fired Pepper Johnson as his defensive coordinator on Monday morning after their season-opening loss to the Houston Roughnecks on Saturday during the league’s inaugural weekend.
The Roughnecks racked up 37 points on the Wildcats in Saturday’s game and smacked quarterbacks Jalan McClendon and Charles Kanoff with five sacks and 16 quarterback hits. The Wildcats scored on a 35-yard field goal near the end of the first half and then surrendered 25 unanswered points.
“We recognize that there are issues we need to address for the 2020 season,” Moss said in a statement released Monday afternoon on the team’s official website. “While these decisions are difficult, we have given this significant thought. We are here to put the best possible product on the field for our fans. We thank Pepper for his contributions to the Wildcards and we are looking forward to our home opener this weekend.”
Moss served as linebackers coach for the Packers during the 2006 season but picked up responsibilities as assistant head coach heading into 2007, keeping both roles until he was fired several days after Mike McCarthy was relieved as head coach. About six months later, Moss was hired to his current positions within the Wildcats as the XFL embarked on its first season.
Prior to coaching, Moss played 11 seasons as a linebacker in the NFL with the Tampa Bay Buccanneers (1987-90), Los Angeles Raiders (1991-94) and Seattle Seahawks (1995-97). The Bucs drafted him out of Miami in the second round of the 1987 draft and saw him tally a career-high 5.5 sacks during his third season in 1989.
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Moss Didn’t Leave Packers on Great Terms
While there was a good chance Moss was going to be let go when the new coaching regime took over for McCarthy, he might have accelerated their decision with his firing coming just hours after he sent a tweet critical of Aaron Rodgers and the organization.
At the time, Moss tweeted: “Ponder this… what Championship teams have are great leadership! Period! It’s not the offensive guru trend, it’s not the safe trend. Find somebody that is going to help #12 and everybody in this building to a #LombardStandard! Period! #losingsucks!”
Moss followed up with another tweet later that day to announce his dismissal, using “#thanktwitter!” to indicate his comments weren’t well received.
A brief bit of closing drama was overshadowed, though, when Bleacher Report’s scathing article that portrayed a toxic relationship between Rodgers and McCarthy was released in April. As media outlets reacted, Moss slipped away into a role with more leadership and a chance to become a pioneer in a new league that proved quite popular in its first weekend.
The Wildcats will host the Dallas Renegades for their home opener at 3 p.m. ET on Sunday.
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