Arizona Cardinals promote WRs coach Shawn Jefferson, 4 others

The Arizona Cardinals promoted five assistants on Tuesday, including wide receivers coach Shawn Jefferson to associate head coach.

Jefferson will still work with Arizona’s wide receivers.

In addition to Jefferson, Arizona promoted Cam Turner and Spencer Whipple to co-pass game coordinators, with the former still coaching quarterbacks. Kenny Bell was also promoted to chief of staff/offensive assistant while former Arizona State Sun Devils QB Mike Bercovici was moved up to offensive assistant.

Jefferson enters his second season with the team, originally signing on as Arizona’s wide receivers coach in 2021 after spending two seasons with the New York Jets as assistant head coach and wide receivers coach.

Turner has been with the team since 2018 and was promoted to QBs coach last season. Under Turner’s tutelage, quarterback Kyler Murray set a franchise record with a 69.2 completion percentage. He also finished the year with a 100.6 passer rating.

Whipple gets an extended role in the passing game after filling in for head coach Kliff Kingsbury in Week 6. With Kingsbury missing the game due to COVID-19, Whipple, in collaboration with other members of the offensive staff, took over play-calling duties in the victory over the Cleveland Browns. Whipple originally joined the Cardinals as a quality control coach in 2019 before being promoted to assistant wide receivers coach last season.

Bell’s promotion comes after spending the last three seasons as an assistant to Kingsbury. Before joining Arizona’s ranks, Bell was chief of staff for the Texas Tech Red Raiders during Kingsbury’s tenure from 2013-18. The pair also spent time at Texas A&M (2012) and Houston (2009-2011). Bell served as the director of recruiting at Texas Tech and was an operations assistant and offensive quality control coach at Houston.

Bercovici moves up to offensive assistant after working as a coaching assistant with the team since 2020. Bercovici began his coaching career as an offensive graduate assistant for ASU in 2019 following his playing days. The assistant was signed as an undrafted rookie free agent in 2016, spending time with the then-San Diego Chargers (2016-17) and Cardinals (2017).

In addition to the numerous promotions, the Cardinals also made the defensive line coach hire of Matt Burke official on Tuesday.

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