Giants Head Coach Brian Daboll Considering Calling Plays in 2024

Daboll had success calling plays during his time in Buffalo.

At the end of last season, New York Giants head coach Brian Daboll left the door open regarding his taking the play-calling duties for the upcoming 2024 season, telling reporters that the team's brass would work through those decisions in the coming months.

But there are too many signs pointing to that being Daboll's preference for 2024 and possibly beyond, starting with the decision to promote offensive coordinator Mike Kafka, the team's primary play caller each of the last two seasons, to assistant head coach duties as part of a plan to prepare Kafka for an eventual head coaching job elsewhere.

The biggest argument supporting Daboll's taking over as the team's primary play caller is history. Daboll won the Giant's head coaching job based on the work he did as the offensive coordinator of the Buffalo Bills, a role in which he was not only the play caller but also responsible for the development of quarterback Josh Allen.

In recent history, the Giants' offense has averaged just 18.6 points per game and was ranked 30th last season in scoring (15.6 points per game).

Speaking of quarterbacks, regardless of whether the Giants pluck one out of next month's draft class, which seems all but certain to happen, Daboll, with his success in putting quarterbacks in a position to be effective, could not only help a rookie down the line but would also help to include Daniel Jones if he is indeed ready to start in Week 1.

“It’s something I’m looking into,” Daboll said Tuesday morning at the NFL owners meeting. I think there are 20 head coaches at this point in time who call plays in the league (either offensively or defensively). I’ve been doing a bunch of research, but no decision has been made. I’m still going through that process, thinking about what we need to do.”

Daboll has a solid track record as a play caller, holding the role in eight NFL seasons, including four with the Bills, who earned three consecutive playoff berths, won two division titles, and advanced to the conference championship game in 2020.

When Daboll was first hired, general manager Joe Schoen preferred that Daboll not be the play caller. The head coach abided by the general manager's wishes, but he never wavered from the opinion that a head coach could also be successful as a playcaller and admitted that he missed having that role.

“Certainly,” he said. “I did it for a long time. There are a lot of things that go into it. Part of the evaluation that I talked about, there are some other things that I’m looking into."

Much like his first season, when he allowed the spring practices to play out and gave Kafka the chance to earn the play-calling role, Daboll is expected to explore the option of continuing with Kafka or taking on the duties himself. And whereas Daboll decided the OTAs wrapped up in 2022, he plans to take his time in deciding what to do moving forward.

“Whatever I feel is best for the football team, that’s where we’ll go,” he said.

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