How ball boy became astute coach of 49ers
Twentyfive years ago, as the 49ers of Steve Young and Jerry Rice steamed to the franchise’s fifth Super Bowl championship, one of the ball boys was an eager, curious 14yearold named Kyle Shanahan.
He roamed the practice field, did laundry, ran errands. Sometimes he hung out with offensive tackle Harris Barton or cornerback Deion Sanders. During training camp Shanahan shared a room with his dad, offensive coordinator Mike Shanahan, and offensive line coach Bobb McKittrick.
“He had a chance to observe some very special players and very special people,” Mike Shanahan said this week in a phone interview. “It was really a great experience for Kyle.”
That wideeyed teenager, a quartercentury later, now
patrols the sideline as head coach of the NFL’s biggest surprise of 2019. The 49ers take a 70 record into Thursday night’s game at Arizona, making them one of two unbeaten teams in the league alongside evermighty New England.
Kyle Shanahan has become the face of the franchise — and it’s a serious, purposeful expression. He intently studies his oversized cardboard sheet of plays during games; confidently paces, stopping only long enough to deliver instructions into the mouthpiece of his headset; and carries himself like an authoritative leader at age 39.
At the same time, Shanahan clearly connects with his players. He’s closer to their generation than most NFL head coaches are, and they speak of him like a respected older brother — impressed by his deep reservoir of football knowledge and comfortable with the lively, genuine vibe he has created.
“He feels like he can trust us, and we trust him,” safety Jimmie Ward said. “Kyle has been around football since he was yay high (holding his hand at knee level), so he knows it. His dad was a great head coach. … Kyle knows how to coach.”
Mike Shanahan is one of only 14 head coaches in NFL history with 170 or more regularseason wins, ahead of Hall of
Famers such as Paul Brown, Bud Grant and Joe Gibbs. Just four head coaches have won more than Shanahan’s two Super Bowl titles: Bill Belichick, Chuck Noll, Bill Walsh and Gibbs.
So Kyle Shanahan had a handy road map, sharpened during four seasons (201013) working alongside his dad as Washington’s offensive coordinator. That’s why, in a March 2018 interview with The Chronicle, he downplayed the suggestion he might have encountered some surprises in his first season at the helm.
“I feel like I was a little different,” Shanahan said, “because I’ve been waiting to be a head coach my whole life.”
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In many ways, San Francisco’s abrupt rise from football’s netherworld — a 2555 record and no playoff appearances the previous five seasons — traces to Kyle Shanahan’s work. And his path to this position traces to a childhood spent immersed in the game, peppering his dad with questions.
Mike Shanahan guided Denver to those two Super Bowl titles, in the 1997 and ’98 seasons. That casts a long shadow, but Kyle is making his own splash. The 49ers, after laboring through two messy rebuilding years under Shanahan and general manager John Lynch, suddenly headline the midseason pack of NFC playoff contenders.
Shanahan — who has three young children with his wife, Mandy — once called his dad his best friend growing up. Football was a perpetual topic of conversation at dinner: Even as an eighthgrader, Kyle asked about free agents worth pursuing and which college players might be available in the draft.
There were other early clues about Shanahan’s desire to chase a career in coaching. He initially played quarterback in high school, but his elbow began bothering him when he threw too much. That prompted a switch to wide receiver (his position in college at Duke and Texas).
Soon thereafter, Mike Shanahan recalled, his son meticulously dissected video of Rice and fellow 49ers wide receiver John Taylor. Kyle learned every route, studied every nuance, absorbed every detail.
This habit extended into adulthood, when he started coaching.
“Kyle was always willing to look at more tape and study the game,” Mike said. “He wanted to find out what everyone in the league was doing. He understood there was only one way to stay on top — to work at his craft — and he does that every day.”
Several earlyseason plays suggest Shanahan’s longtime obsession with video work is paying off. Wide receiver Marquise Goodwin had no defender near him when he caught a 38yard touchdown pass Sept. 15 against Cincinnati. Last Sunday against Carolina, running back Tevin Coleman raced 48 yards, untouched, for a score, and receiver Deebo Samuel similarly cruised 20 yards on another touchdown. Carolina defensive players credited Shanahan’s creative schemes.
None of this surprises former 49ers head coach George Seifert, who worked alongside Mike Shanahan during his three seasons in San Francisco (199294). Seifert raved about Mike’s ability to expose weaknesses in opposing defenses, and he sees similar strengths in Kyle.
Seifert, now 79 and still an avid 49ers fan given his San Francisco roots, pointed to the way backup quarterbacks Nick Mullens and C.J. Beathard improved last season while Jimmy Garoppolo recovered from a torn ACL.
“I’m sure their interaction over the years had a big impact, Kyle’s ability to absorb the way his dad coached,” Seifert said in a phone interview. “I was really impressed with the way he handled the offense last year with a backup quarterback. Now they have their starter and their Dline. … They’ve stuck to their game plan.”
Kyle Shanahan joined the 49ers with a reputation as a play caller extraordinaire. He became an offensive coordinator with Houston in 2008, at age 28, and spent nine seasons in the role with four different teams.
His people skills were more of an open question — see tensions with quarterbacks Donovan McNabb and Robert Griffin III in Washington — but Shanahan drew praise from the 49ers for preventing lockerroom dissension during a seasonopening ninegame losing streak in 2017. This year the players give him credit for keeping them from becoming too full of themselves during their sevengame winning streak.
Shanahan, known for his businesslike public demeanor, even cracks jokes in team meetings, to hear some players tell it.
“He’s kind of like this whole team — a bunch of guys who keep it loose and have a good time, but are 100% focused on the field,” said offensive tackle Joe Staley, whose tenure with the team dates to 2007 and includes six head coaches.
“That’s kind of how Kyle built the locker room. It’s very casual and loose in here. … But when we get on the field, it’s a bunch of guys who just want to work, and I think he sets the tone for that.”
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Shanahan still can be highstrung and demanding, but 49ers players recognize his strategic acumen. This speaks to a realization Seifert had during his coaching days: Players will run through a wall for you if they think you can make them better.
Backup center Ben Garland, who also played for Shanahan in Atlanta in 2015 and ’16, shared an example of his coach’s sharp mind. Shanahan occasionally introduces a play Garland and other players think is “kind of crap” — until Shanahan offers a detailed explanation, including how it will set up another play later in the game. Then it all makes sense.
Even so, Xs and Os never figured to be an issue. Shanahan needed to become acclimated to the wideranging duties of a head coach, everything from clock management to dealing with the media to pregame speeches.
He’s noticeably more comfortable addressing the team now than he was at first, according to Staley.
“I’m just more used to all the different stuff you have to do,” Shanahan said of Year 3. “I knew my routine as a coordinator. You’re still trying to run an offense and call plays, so you want to do everything that’s worked in that same way.
“But you’ve also got to do other stuff as a head coach. You’ve got to work with all different types of people, and I think I’ve gotten a lot better at organizing it.”
Along the way, he remembers his family ties to football. Shanahan awarded a game ball to his dad after the team’s 90 victory Oct. 20 at Washington, a nod to their four years coaching there together and the measure of payback against team owner Daniel Snyder, who fired them in 2013. Mike Shanahan was “very humbled” by the gesture.
Widen the scope and consider this slice of symmetry: Kyle Shanahan is stirring lofty dreams for a proud franchise without a Super Bowl title since the 1994 season … when he was a 49ers ball boy with fanciful ambitions.