Football: Rob Sale leaves Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns offensive coordinator for NFL role with Giants

Tim Buckley, The Advertiser, Feb. 8, 2021

A UL source has confirmed an NFL Network report that offensive coordinator and offensive line coach Rob Sale is leaving the program to become offensive line coach of the New York Giants.

The source requested anonymity because no official announcement has been made.

Sale, who played at LSU and Neville High in Monroe, has been UL’s offensive coordinator and offensive line coach the past three seasons.

Sale and coach Billy Napier did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Sale played in 35 career games for LSU with 25 starts, including 13 at right guard as a senior in 2002.

Two of Sale’s offensive linemen at UL were drafted NFL rookies last season, Robert Hunt with the Miami Dolphins and Kevin Dotson with the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Sale came to UL with Napier, who was Arizona State’s offensive coordinator when Sale was on the staff there in 2017.

He went to Arizona State from ULM, where he was the offensive line coach for one season in 2016.

Sale and late UL offensive line D.J. Looney were were honored Monday by Football Scoop as college football’s 2020 Offensive Line Coaches of the Year. Looney, who was especially close with Sale, who died of a heart attack at Cajun Field during a mini-camp practice in August.

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Sale was at Georgia in 2015, McNeese prior to that and also was a strength and conditioning assistant and offensive analyst at Alabama from 2007-11.

Joe Judge, who just completed his first season as coach of the Giants, was an Alabama special teams assistant during Sale’s final three seasons with the Crimson Tide. The Giants fired offensive coach Marc Colombo during the season and replaced him with Dave DeGuglielmo, who last week was named offensive line coach at Louisiana Tech.

Sale was offensive coordinator for all three of his seasons at UL, but Napier has been the Cajuns’ primary play-caller.

UL has won three bowl games during that span, including a Dec. 26 First Responder Bowl victory over UTSA. The Cajuns return all five starters from their line off a 10-1 team in 2021, including left guard Ken Marks, who will be a seventh-year senior this season. They also added ULM transfer T.J. Fiailoa, who was a freshman with the Warhawks when Sale was in Monroe.

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News of the move by Sale was met with approval from Cajuns who have played for him.

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