Dabo Swinney details plans for Robbie Caldwell's off-field role at Clemson

Clemson assistant coach Robbie Caldwell is transitioning well to his new role as Director of High School Relations and Sophomore Transition. He previously spent the last decade as the Tigers’ offensive line coach.

In his 11 seasons at Clemson, he’s helped lead them to a 121-18 record, 10 seasons of 10 wins or more, seven ACC titles, four appearances in the national championship game including national titles in 2016 and 2018. Under his guidance, Clemson offensive linemen have earned 24 All-ACC selections since 2015, the most from any Power Five program in the country, including 10 first-team all-conference selections, which is tied with Alabama for third-most throughout Power Five conferences.

“He’s already made us better,” Swinney said about Caldwell’s new role. “Robbie’s a worker, like he’s a guy that looks for work every single day. … He’s gonna really, really be great in this role.”

Swinney believes Caldwell is going to be excellent from a high school relations standpoint. His main job will be to work in recruiting, scouting and evaluation. Once the season gets underway, he’ll have a lot of football roles, within the self scout, the crossover study and the opponent study, according to Swinney. He said Caldwell will be a major resource for Clemson over the next year.

“He’s already reached out to me, he’s kind of going state by state from a recruiting standpoint and what he’s trying to do there,” Swinney said.

It isn’t just Caldwell that has had a change in daily duties for the Tigers. last season has sent a wave of departures, promotions and shifts throughout the Clemson coaching staff. Clemson’s offensive coordinator last season Tony Elliott is the new head coach at Duke. Former defensive coordinator Brent Venables took the Oklahoma head coaching gig.

Brandon Streeter is the Tigers’ new offensive coordinator. Wes Goodwin is Clemson’s defensive coordinator, while Mickey Conn also holds a co-defensive coordinator title. Now Caldwell joins the pack of in-house shifts to the coaching staff.

“It’s been good,” Swinney said of Caldwell. “It’s been fun and something we knew was coming, and I’m thankful that he was able to really finish this year the way the way he wanted to and to see those guys play so hard for him, and again, to have a veteran leader like him with a year that was just insane from what we had to manage, especially up front.”