The New York Giants have fired head coach Brian Daboll, a team source confirms to Heavy Sports, and are sticking with a familiar member of the coaching staff as his interim replacement.
Mike Kafka will take over as the Giants‘ interim head coach, beginning immediately, league sources tell Heavy Sports.
Daboll’s firing comes on the heels of a disastrous fourth-quarter collapse, in a 24-20 loss to the Chicago Bears that dropped his record as Giants head coach to just 20-40-1, in a game that saw first-round rookie quarterback Jaxson Dart suffer a concussion.
“It’s a shame he got hurt,” Daboll told reporters following Sunday’s loss, of Dart’s injury.
Through the first two months of Dart’s career, he has already undergone four concussion checks, and Daboll’s inability to prevent the former Ole Miss standout from taking unnecessary hits on the run or protect him in the pocket likely contributed to the former head coach’s downfall.
Why Mike Kafka as interim head coach makes sense for Jaxson Dart, Giants
GettyMike Kafka has been named interim head coach of the New York Giants.
Firing Daboll with eight weeks remaining in the regular season gives the Giants the opportunity to evaluate Kafka, viewed by many inside the league as a rising star in the coaching community, and whether he can accelerate Dart’s development and offer the kind of progress owner John Mara hoped to see from Daboll this season.
Kafka, 38, has interviewed for several head coaching vacancies across the NFL over the past two offseasons, and served as one of the head coaches in the Senior Bowl collegiate All-Star Game last year.
The former five-year NFL quarterback joined the Giants’ staff as Daboll’s offensive coordinator, back in 2022, before ascending to the role of Assistant Head Coach prior to the 2024 campaign.
Kafka is expected to be among the most sought after coaching candidates in the months ahead, including potentially as the next head coach of the Tennessee Titans–who selected quarterback Cam Ward No. 1 overall in last spring’s NFL Draft, and could covet a quarterback whisperer to oversee his development and their program.
However, now the Giants will have a significant stretch of games to determine if he offers enough upside to take over the head coaching role permanently in East Rutherford, and if continuity is what is best to get the most out of Dart, moving forward.
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This article was originally published on Heavy Sports
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