David Shaw has made his first staffing move as Stanford Cardinal head coach by finding someone to occupy his previous position at offensive coordinator. The Cardinal Report (Stanford's Rivals site) tweets that current wide receivers coach Pep Hamilton will move into handling playcalling duties. It'll be the first time Hamilton has been an offensive coordinator since 1999-2001, when he was OC and quarterbacks coach at Howard University.
Hamilton has spent over a decade floating around the NFL. He was an intern with the Kansas City Chiefs, Washington Redskins, and the Baltimore Ravens. He then spent another half-decade as quarterbacks coach with other teams like the New York Jets, San Francisco 49ers and Chicago Bears, tutoring players like Quincy Carter, Alex Smith, Rex Grossman (he was the quarterbacks coach when the Bears went to the Super Bowl), Kyle Orton, and Jay Cutler.
You'd have to imagine that if Shaw was a popular hire in the locker room, then Hamilton must have also had a good voice inside as well. It has to be given that his relationship with Andrew Luck must be solid. However, with Luck's three primary targets (Doug Baldwin, Ryan Whalen and Chase Beeler) all departing, can Hamilton utilize the remaining stars like Chris Owusu and Griff Whalen properly and help Luck adapt to tougher circumstances?