The New York Giants are gearing up for training camp in six weeks, but the question of who will call the offensive plays still hangs in the air. On Wednesday at minicamp, offensive coordinator Mike Kafka made it clear that he's ready to roll with whatever head coach Brian Daboll decides. "I think Dabes hasn't really made a final call on that yet," Kafka said. "We're going through the spring right now. It's kind of too early to tell. Whatever decision he goes with, I fully support."
Head coach Brian Daboll chimed in, praising Kafka for his teamwork. "Mike is a good teammate. Provides a lot of value, has a lot of good insight," Daboll said. "It's been a really good collaborative process of ideas and it's a good time now to go ahead and look at things and see how they do."
After a dramatic offseason where Daboll emerged victorious in an internal power struggle, leading to the dismissal of coordinators Wink Martindale and Thomas McGaughey, Kafka remains standing. He nearly left, testing the waters in the annual coaching carousel but ultimately returned to the Giants. Despite his return and an elevation to assistant head coach by Daboll, Kafka seems somewhat sidelined this spring.
"I'm just complementary to Dabes, helping out with offensive drills," Kafka shared. "You'll see me walking around and being an asset to the coaches and the players wherever I can. Whether it's fundamentals, technique, whether it's thoughts and ideas on routes or protections, stuff like that."
The play-calling debate is intriguing because calling plays in the NFL is typically the offensive coordinator's job. However, with Daboll being one of the league's best a few years back, he's been hesitant to relinquish control entirely. "I'm not worried about that kind of stuff right now," Kafka noted. "We're in the spring and we have so much stuff that we have to improve as an offense fundamentally, technique-wise. That's really where my focus is at."
Kafka mentioned that the dynamic hasn't shifted much since he arrived in 2022. Both he and Daboll collaborate on the game plan, and either could call the plays on game day. "It's collaborative. From Day 1 it's been that way," he said.
"Every year brings new opportunities, and so I'm taking this as an opportunity just to continue to grow as a coach and be, again, an asset to those coaches and players," Kafka added. When asked about how he might complement Daboll, Kafka didn't have much to say. "There is a lot of things on a given play you can look at and detail up. I'm always looking to have some feedback with the players, get their interactions on how they saw the play, and then give my feedback," he explained. "Then we talk about it on the field and we talk about it in the meeting room and get those things cleaned up."
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