Kyle Shanahan will face a former boss Monday night, and he said Thursday how much he learned from him.
Shanahan was offensive coordinator under Dan Quinn with the Atlanta Falcons in 2015 and 2016, a stretch that ended with a loss in Super Bowl LI. Quinn is now the Washington Commanders’ head coach.
“I’m very grateful for the time I got with Dan. I learned so much from him," Shanahan said of his time in Atlanta. “I’d say before I got there, I was so consumed with X’s and O’s and always trying to find the right answer, which I still am, but I learned such other attributes from Dan. That’s something that I’ve really learned from him, that the more you talk about it, the more you show it, the more you can get your guys to play to a certain style. He made me a much better coach that way.”
Shanahan said he was initially frustrated by Quinn's team meetings that had little to do with schemes, but learned to understand how they would help him become a better coach and communicator.
“I remember certain team meetings we’d have where he’s talking about the ball or we’re just doing random things that don’t have much to do with X’s and O’s,” Shanahan said, recalling that he was thinking, “‘Holy crap, I’m running out of time. I have a lot of important stuff to cover.’
"Realizing how important it is to constantly have people together talking about things other than just the X’s and O’s,” Shanahan said. He pointed to what Quinn called “the brotherhood,” the way players approach tackling and play “down-in and down-out.”
“I think that’s what you see with Dan on every team,” Shanahan said.
The 49ers are 5-0 and lead the NFL in point differential, with the league’s third-ranked offense and third-ranked defense in points. Shanahan said he expects the Commanders, who are only 1-3-1 to arrive motivated.
“Anytime your record isn’t as good as it should be... I think that they have a much better team than that,” he said.
Shanahan has faced Quinn from the opposite sideline four times since they worked together in Atlanta, and the 49ers have won three of them. Quinn’s Falcons took the first meeting, 29-22, in 2019. Since then, Shanahan has beaten Quinn when he was the Cowboys defensive coordinator three times: in the 2021 NFC Wild Card round, in the 2022 NFC Divisional Round and 42-10 on Sunday Night Football in 2023. However, he's never coached against Quinn while he's been the Commanders' head coach.
This article originally appeared on Niners Wire: Kyle Shanahan explains who helped make him ‘a much better coach’