One of the most interesting things to watch in the upcoming Vikings season will be the inner workings of the Vikings offensive coaching staff led by coordinator Kevin Stefanski and offensive advisor Gary Kubiak.
It's a fascinating dynamic with the 37-year old Stefanski as a first-time coordinator with input coming from the 57 year old Kubiak, a Super Bowl winning head coach in Denver four years ago when he was overseeing the offense run by Peyton Manning. Kubiak also was the de facto coordinator as head coach in Houston for eight years and he was an offensive coordinator for 12 years with the Broncos plus one season in Baltimore.
Seems like a situation that could be intimidating to a young coordinator but I know both Stefanski and Kubiak well enough that I think they will work great together. What will help the cause is that Stefanski is supremely confident and Kubiak is a low key person who is pleasant to be around. They both have said all the right things through OTAs and minicamp that wrapped up last week. So I think Stefanski is welcoming the input from Kubiak who is happy in his new role and is not looking to overstep the bounds.
"I like to be surrounded by smart people like Gary," Stefanski said earlier this offseason. "We kind of see the game the same way and I can't tell you how lucky I am to work with a guy who has been to seven Super Bowls as a player and coach."
Kubiak has kept a low profile since coming aboard but he did speak with the media after minicamp concluded last week and said he's enjoying his new role. "It's a different role," he said. "I I get to watch guys coach and we've got some good young coaches on our offensive staff. Being with Kevin every day, watching him teach and do the things I did for 30 plus years and sitting down with him every day after practice talking through situations has been really good. I'm very impressed with Kevin's work ethic, his passion and his ability to reach people. He has grown up with some West Coast offense guys so we talked the same language pretty quick and have come up with the Minnesota offense, figuring out what our guys do best and how to get our guys the ball.
"Being around Coach Zim who I battled against for many years and he does an excellent job and is so organized. I try to keep my mouth shut, do my job and hopefully I can help out. We've got good people, a great organization and good football players so I'm looking forward to the season."
Kubiak spoke about his work with Kirk Cousins in saying, "I've coached a lot of quarterbacks, they're all different in what they do best. For me the biggest thing is watching Kirk and getting to know him better each day. I had a little cheat sheet on Kirk from talking with Mike Shanahan who coached him for many years (in Washington). Kirk and I talk every day and now it's about me working my tail off to help put him in the best possible position for our football team to be successful."
He's also impressed with what he's seen from Cousins. "The thing that jumps out at me is he's extremely accurate. He plays the game on the move really well. He works hard. He's the first one here in the morning and gives you everything he has which is all you can ask for."
I give credit to Zimmer for his personal confidence as shown by his willingness to bring in a coach with Kubiak's pedigree. I've been around a lot of coaches who would feel threatened to know there's a Super Bowl winning head coach on staff who would be an obvious candidate to be an interim head coach if things went bad during the season.
"Gary is an unbelievably great person," Zimmer said. "It's been outstanding for me because we can go back and talk about other teams and the way the offense has been installed. We'll talk about some head coach things such as when you were in Houston or Denver, what did you do? He's an excellent football coach and does a great job so it's been really good."
From Cousins' perspective, he's likes the combination of Stefanski (his QB coach most of last year until he became interim coordinator for the last three games) and Kubiak helping him and the offense. ""I'm excited about our leadership in the offensive room," Cousins said. "Kevin is a sharp mind, classy person, knows football really well and then you add Gary Kubiak and the rest of our offensive coaches. If we do what they tell us, I think we'll have a lot of success."
Around the NFL Observations:
1. It was interesting to hear former Chicago head coach John Fox's opinion on ESPN that the Bears had the worst offseason in the entire NFL because of their kicking situation (that cost them in the playoff loss to the Eagles). "I think when you're going to play defense, you're going to lean on takeaways to help a young offense and you don't have a reliable kicker, that you're going to need those points after some of those turnovers," he said. "I think the kicking question is really big right now in Chicago. And I think that might be a problem for them in the season."
Fox's comments are a bit harsh and could be a case of sour grapes after he was fired two years ago. But the fact is the Bears will have two unproven NFL kickers at the start of training camp--Eddie Pineiro and Elliott Fry so the Vikings hope it winds up being the thorn in the Bears' side that Fox is predicting.
2. This is the so-called dead period in the NFL when players are only allowed in team facilities for injury rehab and coaches are on vacation. But that doesn't mean players and coaches are sitting on the beach for six weeks until training opens in late July. Players know they must stay in shape so they don't come to camp and pull a muscle because they've been taking it easy. And coaches usually are back at work shortly after July 4 and guys like Zimmer are periodically checking their iPads while on vacation as they view OTAs and minicamp practices to see things they'd like to tweak (Zimmer told the media he had his iPad loaded up for his down time on his Kentucky ranch).
He and his assistants also may be peeking ahead to view video of the Falcons, Packers, Raiders and Bears as they think about the first quarter of the regular season and the desire to get off to a fast start.