Panthers Fire Ejiro Evero: Todd Wash Takes Over the Defense After the 27-19 Loss at Green Bay
Carolina head coach Dave Canales fired his defensive coordinator and his pass game coordinator on Friday morning, Athlon Sports reported. Ejiro Evero, once a head-coaching candidate who signed an extension through 2027, is out after the run defense gave up 200-yard games for the 12th time on his watch.
The Carolina Panthers fired defensive coordinator Ejiro Evero on Friday morning, less than a day after a 27-19 loss to the Green Bay Packers at Lambeau Field dropped the team to 3-4, Athlon Sports reported. Defensive pass game coordinator Jonathan Cooley was also fired, and defensive line coach Todd Wash was promoted to interim defensive coordinator. ESPN's Jeremy Fowler first reported Evero's firing, calling it, in Athlon's account, 'a sizable cleaning of defensive house in Carolina,' and the team confirmed both moves.
The run defense is what ended it. Carolina entered Thursday night allowing a league-worst 153.2 rushing yards per game, 7.5 more than any other team, Athlon reported. Tampa Bay ran for 258 yards against the Panthers on Sunday, the 12th time an opponent has rushed for 200 yards since Evero was hired - the most in the league over that span, according to ESPN figures carried by Athlon. In 2024 his defense gave up 3,057 rushing yards, the first unit since 1980 to allow more than 3,000.
The fall was swift. Evero arrived in Charlotte in 2023, a year before head coach Dave Canales, and was one of the few holdovers Canales kept. He had been viewed for years as a future head coach - he interviewed with the Falcons, Steelers and Raiders in the last hiring cycle - and ESPN's Mike Kaye reported he signed an extension in 2025 running through the 2027 season. Bleacher Report noted Carolina had allowed 70 points across two losses in four days before the change.
Wash, who has coached Carolina's defensive line since 2023 and called plays as Jacksonville's defensive coordinator from 2016 through 2020, gets time the schedule rarely gives: the Panthers do not play again until November 8, when the Denver Broncos come to Charlotte, Athlon reported. NFL Trade Rumors put Carolina's 2026 defense at No. 23 in yards allowed, No. 27 in points per game and No. 30 against the run. For Austin's NFL audience, the firing is the morning-after chapter of a game this station covered on Thursday night - Green Bay's 27-19 win, in which Jordan Love threw three touchdown passes.
