At his final press conference as a coach with the New Orleans Saints last year, then offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak choked up over the toll his profession took on his family. The Kubiaks had moved from Minnesota to Denver to San Francisco to New Orleans. Four states in four years.
And Kubiak knew that, with the Saints changing coaching staffs, he was likely headed to join a fifth team in five years.
“It’s not fun as a dad to move your family around,” Kubiak said. “I can’t thank my wife enough and my kids enough for being so awesome and being there with me.”
A year later, the Kubiaks are poised to move again.
But this time, they probably won’t mind the change.
After Sunday’s Super Bowl, Kubiak is expected to become the next head coach of the Las Vegas Raiders. But first, he’ll have to call plays for the Seattle Seahawks against the New England Patriots to determine this season’s champion. The path is quite the turnaround for Kubiak — who oversaw a decimated offense with the Saints, only to engineer one of the league’s top offenses in Seattle and land his first head coaching gig as a result.
It turns out that having a healthy supporting cast can make all the difference, huh?
Kubiak’s tenure with the Saints was overshadowed by injuries. After two explosive outings in which New Orleans put up at least 40 points to begin the year, Kubiak lost piece after piece. First, it was center Erik McCoy — whose loss on the interior contributed heavily to the eventual seven-game losing streak that cost coach Dennis Allen his job. But Kubiak also had to navigate without his pair of top receivers, his star running back and even his starting quarterback. Derek Carr missed a total of eight games with two separate injuries, and the Saints failed to win one in his absence.
In Seattle, Kubiak hasn’t had nearly the same problems. And there, he’s had the tools to unlock his offensive vision. Seattle finished with a top-10 offense thanks to a terrific season from quarterback Sam Darnold, having one of the best receivers in football in Jaxon Smith-Njigba and a powerful rushing attack led by Kenneth Walker.
New Orleans seemed to be the opportunity for Kubiak to have a major breakthrough in the NFL — the kind that would lead to a promotion and widespread recognition.
That ended up coming in Seattle.
“We’ve got some really good players,” Kubiak told reporters at Super Bowl Opening Night, according to 9News’ Mike Klis. “Mike Macdonald is a great coach. And it all starts with players that are healthy and we’ve been healthy throughout the season. Our guys got to grow together, get better together.
“When you have injuries and guys are in and out of the lineup, it hurts production, but we’ve been able to grow together.”
Kubiak didn’t get that chance in New Orleans. Even then, it arguably wouldn’t have ended up in the Super Bowl appearance that he’s facing now. But Allen hired Kubiak because of the system he brought with him. The son of former NFL coach Gary Kubiak, Klint Kubiak grew up well-versed in the wide-zone system that has taken the league by storm. In New Orleans and Seattle, Kubiak has focused on running plays and trotting out formations that look the same, but often keep the defense guessing.
Notably, Kubiak has earned a reputation for making his quarterback’s life easier. Carr, for instance, repeatedly mentioned how Kubiak’s offense was “freeing.” The pure-progression reads, heavy use of motion and mix of play-action boots allowed for Carr to make simpler decisions. Darnold, too, has had success in his first year with the Seahawks after playing in a similar offense with the Vikings and San Francisco 49ers.
Kubiak’s work with quarterbacks is likely what appealed to the Raiders — who hold the first pick in the NFL draft and are in line to take Indiana quarterback Fernando Mendoza.
Carr, speaking on the podcast he runs with his brother David this week, said that Kubiak runs a scheme that players believe in.
“It is so abundantly clear who you are as an offense when you’re in a room with him,” Carr said. “You know the standard. You know exactly what’s asked of you. And if you’re not doing it, he tells you, and then you’re gone. He’s just honest.”
During that conversation, Carr also endorsed his former coach as a leader. Coincidentally, that’s one area that Kubiak will have to demonstrate once he takes over the Raiders — much in the same way that Kellen Moore had to once the Saints hired him last offseason. As smart as Kubiak is, can he be The Guy to lead a team?
Carr and many of Kubiak’s players have said that he can. The former quarterback said Kubiak has a “stoic” presence that allows him to be clear with players. Seattle offensive lineman Grey Zabel noted his coordinator’s strong work ethic that takes “a lot of ownership” of the offense.
Kubiak, too, is more demanding than his public persona suggests. Though he joked that he had a “wet-blanket” personality when he was with the Saints, Kubiak shared a revealing story this week of how he rode a wide receiver so hard as a graduate assistant at Texas A&M that he assumed the player was never going to talk to him again once the season was over.
Then, one day, after Kubiak had taken a job outside of football for an oil-field service company, Kubiak got a call from that wideout.
“He basically said, ‘Hey, thanks for working with me, making me better,’” Kubiak told reporters. “And I ended up quitting that (oil) job the next day and trying to get back into football. It was that phone call, the realization of it’s about these relationships.”
Those relationships have led him to the Super Bowl on the cusp of leading his own team next season — relationships that include his time in New Orleans.