Nothing has overtaken offenses in the NFL more than the various wide zone systems in recent years. The system has emerged as one of the league’s most sought-after influences, attracting interest from teams like the Miami Dolphins, Houston Texans, and San Francisco 49ers to the Los Angeles Rams. The New Orleans Saints entered the discussion ahead of the 2024 campaign when they hired former 49ers passing game specialist Klint Kubiak.
The Saints’ acquisition, though, adds a degree of detail that may raise false expectations but is also one of the move’s greatest advantages. They brought on a coach who had only worked closely with 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan for a single year.
For many, the question is straightforward: Was one season sufficient to understand the system and apply it to New Orleans? The advantage, though, is that Kubiak’s ties to the plan date back before what is now called “the Shanahan system.” I know you’re asking how that’s even feasible. The response is straightforward: The fathers of Kyle Shanahan and Klint Kubiak, Mike Shanahan and Gary Kubiak, are credited with developing the ideas, precepts, and fundamentals of the Shanahan offense.
It would perhaps be more accurate to refer to the current “Shanahan system” as the “Shanahan-Kubiak system.” The scheme’s roots are still in the 49ers, but its inspiration goes all the way back to the 1994 NFL season, when offensive coordinator Mike Shanahan and quarterbacks coach Gary Kubiak led San Francisco’s top-ranked scoring offense to a Super Bowl victory.
The two coaches had a terrific run of elite quarterbacks to help them, with Steve Young in San Francisco followed by John Elway when the older Shanahan and Kubiak took over the head coach and offensive coordinator jobs respectively in Denver soon after.
The tenets of the scheme were the same then as they are now. They incorporated eye candy like motion and post-snap movement, crossing routes, attacking the middle of the field in the passing game, and emphasized play action and the quick passing game to name a few elements. Add in the outside zone run scheme and the added wrinkle of running the same play from multiple formations and it can be hard to distinguish between the past and present versions. The differences are minuscule though specific.
The system is a quarterback-friendly one, as Saints Head Coach Dennis Allen stated this week on The NFL Report. It finds its truth in the quick passing game, the emphasis on offensive line talent, the dedication to the run game, and the simplification of the reads made by the passer behind a mask of complexity that challenges opposing defenses.
These are the fundamental elements of the Shanahan system that existed before the current one. Gary Kubiak and Mike Shanahan lived together in Denver from 1995 to 2005. The club finished in the top 10 in scoring nine out of those eleven seasons, and in the top 10 in total yards ten times.
Some brilliant coaches—Kyle Shanahan among them—have built upon the revolutionary system’s success and popularized it in a modern manner while working under Gary Kubiak in Houston. Thus, despite Klint Kubiak’s brief tenure under the younger Shanahan, he is well-positioned to be the next to unveil an updated version of the NFL’s most well-liked scheme.
