JACKSONVILLE – The idea is to keep improving – and not waste energy comparing.
Jaguars Head Coach Liam Coen said that's a theme for the coming season, saying at this week's NFL 2026 Annual League Meetings that the Jaguars can't worry about what happened in 2025. Nor can they focus on matching the record from that season.
The focus must be the future, which must be judged on its own.
"It we're chasing those results, we're not going to be living in the moment," he said.
Coen, speaking at the annual AFC Coaches breakfast at the Arizona Biltmore Tuesday morning, said being a better team in 2026 doesn't necessarily mean matching a 13-4 record in 2025.
"There are a lot of different ways to view success," Coen said. "Something we need to be guarded against as a staff and an organization is we have a lot of room to improve. We need to get better and improve and that may not be 13 wins. I don't know. I can't say that.
"I don't know what those results are, but I know if we're chasing those results, we're not going to get the best version of ourselves every day."
The Jaguars in Coen's first season as head coach won their final eight regular-season games in 2025, winning their first AFC South title since 2022 – their third in the last nine seasons. They will begin their 2026 voluntary offseason program April 20, with the program beginning two weeks later this offseason than last.
Teams with first-year head coaches can begin their offseason programs April 6.
"When we get back to this, with less time as a coaching staff, with less time with the players as not a new coaching staff, we need to be as intentional as ever with the way that we attack each day," Coen said. "We need to be clear and concise with the players when they come back in about what that looks like and how it's going to get done. We have no time to waste."
Added Coen, "You feel a sense of urgency. That has been the challenge to our coaching staff, to our department staffs. When the players get in here, the message will be, 'How do we get better, how do we improve with less time together – less time together as a staff, less time together once the players get in here?'
"Our time on task, our intentionality, has to be better than ever. That's the challenge I have for everybody – myself included."
NOTABLE
Coen also this week discussed fourth-year veteran linebacker Ventrell Miller, who entered the 2025 season as a co-starter with Devin Lloyd, who was named Associated Press second-team All-Pro last season and who signed with the Carolina Panthers as an unrestricted free agent last month. Miller, a fourth-round selection by the Jaguars in the 2023 NFL Draft, started two of 17 games played in 2025 after starting nine the previous season and registered 27 tackles in 2025 with four passes defensed. He also had 11 special teams tackles in 2025. "There's a lot of room for growth there," Coen said. "When Ventrell was asked to play a lot of meaningful snaps last year, we saw some really good things and then there's some things we can continue to coach off of. Right now if you're him and we haven't signed anybody yet, you should say, 'Well, at least they believe in me. At least they think I can do it.' Now it's on him and us to go do it together but also like, 'Dude. Now, it's time. Now, it's time to truly go take it over.' There's going to be an opportunity there and I think Ventrell is made of the right stuff and I think he cares enough about it from a we-above-me standpoint that he's going to put the time in to do it and I'm excited about what that could look like."
QUOTABLE
Coen on Jaguars nose tackle DaVon Hamilton, a key reason the Jaguars led the NFL in run defense in 2025: "He doesn't say a ton. He just does his job to the best of his ability every single day without saying a word of negative – or anything. He cares about 'we above me.' He cares about all the right things. A lot of his job is selfless and helping others, helping get other people freed up in the run game. He's disruptive. I mean he made huge plays in the backfield for us. He's just getting better and better."
