When Seattle Seahawks great KJ Wright decided to join the coaching staff of the NFC West rival San Francisco 49ers, he had a good reason he didn't choose to start his coaching career with the Seahawks: Seattle didn't offer him a job. Now, with the 49ers, the former linebacker is moving up quickly.
He began as a defensive quality-control/assistant linebackers coach in 2024 and returned to that role last year. In 2026, Wright will be promoted to linebackers coach. This, of course, is a position he knows well, but the spot is also just one more step in what appears to be inevitable.
As with inside linebacker teammate Bobby Wagner, Wright wasn't just a physically skilled player, but an intelligent one as well. Maybe no one in the history of the league has been better at attacking screen passes, for instance, and that doesn't happen without an innate sense of how the play is unfolding.
Former Seattle Seahawks great KJ Wright gets a promotion with the San Francisco 49ers
Wright's success gets a little complicated for 12s. Fans want him to do well as a person because the coach was a very good human being with Seattle, and that doesn't stop once he stopped playing football. He's a good guy who deserves good things.
On the flipside, a former player who helped the Seattle Seahawks win a Super Bowl and played for the team for 10 years is now helping one of Seattle's greatest rivals scheme to keep head coach Mike Macdonald's team from repeating as Super Bowl champions. It is the way the NFL works, but it can be brutal emotionally.
Of course, hope could lie in the future. It isn't as if KJ Wright is stuck working for the San Francisco 49ers. He could eventually come back to Seattle and work under Macdonald. Perhaps he becomes the defensive coordinator one day, assuming Aden Durde gets a head coaching gig at some point.
Maybe Wright becomes DC, and Bobby Wagner is working on his staff as the linebackers coach. Anything is possible, and it is a nice thought.
To be sure, though, the 49ers do not want to give up KJ Wright anytime soon. Former San Francisco DC and new Tennessee Titans head coach Robert Saleh thought he might want to bring Wright with him to Nashville this offseason, but Saleh told the media at the NFL annual meeting this week, "It was an understanding from the beginning. Off limits."
Saleh also said he sees the former Seahawks player as moving up coaching ranks fast, "He's going to be a coordinator really quick. I could see him easily progressing the way DeMeco did. He's got the same mindset. He's got the same respect from his players. KJ's going to be really good."
Of course, 12s already assumed that, and good for Wright. Let's just hope his future success lies with Seattle.