We are currently scheduling a few interviews. Quarterbacks coach Brian Griese may also be interviewed for the role of offensive coordinator, as is 49ers passing game specialist Klint Kubiak, who is interviewing for the Chicago Bears. With Adam Peters being appointed as Washington Commanders’ new general manager, it implies he (or his soon-to-be-hired head coach) may also come to the 49ers seeking someone to run that side of the ball.
The 49ers have an extremely special card that they can play, as stated in the Black Monday tracker. In addition to leading the 49ers, Kyle Shanahan is their offensive coordinator. Shanahan may just promote someone from within if a team wants to use one of his employees for the same role elsewhere. When this happened to Mike McDaniel, it was more of a promotion than a move to keep him from going to work as an offensive coordinator outside the team at the time.
It’s important to remember that the 49ers are unable to completely prevent assistants from interviewing for a coordinator role (a promotion). The 49ers, of all teams, regularly engaged in this behavior, leading to a rule change in 2020 to forbid it.
If Griese or Kubiak need to go, the 49ers can use the offense to play this card again. The 49ers have the option to elevate the concerned individual to offensive coordinator. The problem is that they are limited to one promotion. Many of you might advise making them “co-offensive coordinators,” along with anybody else the league poaches, but that strategy rarely succeeds. That might also just last a year because there’s no stopping the team from preventing you from taking the offensive coordinator position all to yourself if you share it. Furthermore, why would you give up the opportunity to be the only offensive coach in favor of sharing it with someone else? Especially when you already are going to have Shanahan’s fingerprints on everything.
Even if the assistant might interview for a head coaching position in the future, it makes more sense to promote them to offensive coordinator.
These are all interviews, of course, but the 49ers might need to employ some cunning to hang onto their support. The issue is that they can probably only rely on one offensive assistant. With whom would you go?
In addition to bringing Jimmy Garoppolo back into the fold in 2022 and turning Brock Purdy into a star in 2023, Griese performed his duties as a QB whisperer in 2022. In the same vein, Kubiak deserves credit for some extremely inventive pass plays that the 49ers have produced. Might his departure have an impact on that very creativity? Though it won’t collapse by any means, Mike McDaniel’s move to the Miami Dolphins left a noticeable impact on the running game.
On offense, whoever do you cling to, and why? Which guy do you have to hold onto?
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