Interview with coach Jakub Samel

Gary Kubiak, assistant to Jakub Samel. Is it reality or surrealism?

Jakub Samel: - Maybe not an assistant, but a consultant. It is an amazing matter and an opportunity for me to draw from this enormous amount of knowledge and experience. This will help all people associated with football in Poland.

Establishing cooperation with Gary Kubiak would not be possible without many years of hard work.

That's correct, but the entire Panthers organization has helped. I was talking to coach Kubiak myself, but I got a lot of support from everyone. It is not only my success, but also the whole club.

How did it come about?

I noticed on Twitter the profile of the National Polish American Sports Hall of Fame, where outstanding figures of sport with Polish roots are commemorated. I went to their website and started browsing it. I thought it was an interesting way to get in touch. And there are quite a few football names out there - from Mike Ditka to Mike Munchak. However, they received the award long ago. I looked at 2017 photos from the ceremony and I see Gary Kubiak, who came to the gala with his wife. It was an impulse to try. I have read that his wife's surname is "Kaminski". They both have Polish roots. I wrote a message, contacted the director of the center, and through him I sent a letter invitation to Poland. It was in 2020. We finally made it, we got in touch with his wife when coach Kubiak was the Minnesota Vikings offensive coordinator in the NFL. She admitted that they are very interested and have strong Polish roots. They also live in a Polish community in the USA, it is important to them. They have been to Poland only once and they want to do it again.

At the American Football Coaches Association (AFCA) 2022 conference in San Antonio, you met at his ranch.

It was a good thing because they live just 3 hours from San Antonio.

It's worth being patient.

Definitely! To make contact with such people you need to be patient. He has a lot on his mind and you can't just call or come.

However, you had regular contact with Kubiak earlier. You talked on the Internet, among others about football strategy.

We have been talking on Zoom since September and we regularly watch videos of matches of the teams he was leading himself. He is very open to sharing knowledge and this is how I see his role. You can learn a lot from his experiences.

You have already had mentoring support from Rick Rhoades and recently from Jeff Jagodzinski. They both lived in Wrocław during the games.

It cannot be compared. They were on site and worked with the players on a daily basis, leading specific formations or positional training. The role of a consultant is primarily for me, I can get advise.

So you can contact coach Kubiak at any time of the day or night.

Let's not go that crazy. But I can assure you that he is very open to cooperation. Nobody is forcing him to do it.

Was he surprised that football is played in Poland?

He didn't know it, but when he saw everything unfold, he decided that he wanted to help. Coach Kubiak will come to Wrocław before the season, but it will be a tourist visit. He will see Wrocław and Poland from a different perspective. We start training in March. We'll see what happens.

You participated in the AFCA convention for the third time. How has your perception of this event changed?

The experience helped, I knew what this convention looks like, what is going on, where it is worth going, how to behave and look for networking. For several years, I got some contacts and recalled myself at every possible opportunity. We greeted each other in the corridors, we talked. In addition, participation in lectures conducted by trainers of various levels. I already know where it is worth going and with whom to talk to at such conventions. This is important because there were 10,000 coaches on the spot.

I.a., one of NCAA's highest-paid trainers, Mel Tucker, appeared. At the same time, the speakers were the coaches of the high school teams. A huge gap, but many NFL players emphasize that the coach who influenced them the most was at school.

The difference is that the high school coach does not choose players most often, but only has those who come to a given institution to learn, e.g. due to the geographical division. You can get a lot out of how to deal with it and how to develop your juniors. In turn, at the highest level, there is always one or two sentences that stay in the memory for a longer time. I listened to Mel Tucker's talk and he was well prepared. You can see why he achieved such success so quickly. He showed his great side, captivated the audience.

He did not perform serfdom in front of coaches from all over the world.

It is also a distinction for them. They can show themselves, and this is a convention they have been riding for years. They once participated in the conference as insignificant assistants who want to learn networking, and after many years they come back as millionaires and can speak to everyone.

Will it be like that with Jakub Samel?

These are far-reaching plans. I just have more down-to-earth things to do, step by step. These coaches also said that they never thought of getting to a place like this. One can look with optimism at the future of football development in Europe and the paths that are opening up for everyone related to this sport.

You emphasized that school coaches work with players from a given region, with no choice. This is reminiscent of Polish football, where most of the players play where they live.

This is a good translation and you can see how the high school coaches are pulling as much as possible from the players available. Coaches in Poland and Europe have a lot of similar problems - they cannot choose a player for a given situation. However, team building problems can be encountered in high school, college, and the NFL. It's not that there are logs under your feet on one level and not on another.

What problem did you encounter several years ago when you started your adventure with football, and at the same time you are trying to solve it in the European League of Football, where organizationally it is the highest level in Europe?

These might not be a problem, but you have to keep telling the players how to train, how to behave on the field. Repeat over and over again about making possible mistakes, flags. This should be reminded to players of all levels. If this is not done, it is the easiest way to lose games. You saw it last year. Ball security is very important - regardless of the higher or lower level of the game. Penalties in defense also repeat at each level.

An example is the Dallas Cowboys, who lost to the San Francisco 49ers largely to flags in their Wild Card phase of the NFL. Throughout the season, they were one of the worst teams in the league in terms of discipline.

And as you can see, these mistakes appear at every level of football. The class of the player changes, the number of spectators in the stands, the money, but the fundamental problems are the same everywhere.

British coach Rich Worsell is the first European coach on the D1 team. As an assistant at Akron, he also spoke at the convention. There are more and more players in the NCAA and NFL from other continents, is it the same for the coaches?

The openness to international football is getting bigger, and when looking at the players, it is also glancing at the coaches. Someone had to train these players, at least on a basic level. Rich's example is great. He's come a long way to where he is. I had contact with him before, it is an inspiring story confirming that also outside the United States there are coaches who know what American football is. And their path is more difficult, because access to training materials is different than in the USA. In Poland, when I am 20, I will not get in the car and go to the nearest D1 university and ask for a free internship throughout the season. That is why this determination of trainers from other continents shows the Americans that if someone is able to sacrifice so much on the other side of the Atlantic, it can also work for them.

You participated in a summer internship with Coach Neal Brown at West Virginia University and Troy University. The ELF season, however, lasts from June to September and a trip to the US, during the NCAA preparation camp, is impossible. Can you then come back to the US after the ELF season and during the academic games?

There is such a possibility, and I must admit that I thought about it. I haven't been to the US for longer during the season yet. That would be another lesson for me. That is why I am constantly working on networking - the more contacts, the greater the chance for such a trip.

You emphasize the importance of networking with other coaches. And what exactly?

You have to show that you keep in touch not only when you need something. You need to remind yourself, send a short message. Top level coaches are always busy. The most important thing is that they remember you. It is worth sending an e-mail or SMS, it pays off for the future. This year I was approached by an offensive coach from Central Florida, who had previously been to Texas Longhorns, greeted me himself and asked what was going on there. It's nice.

It was the first time for ELF to attend this convention, the coach of Istanbul Rams Val Gunn had his lecture, who also is the former Panthers coach. How is this league perceived? We forget that not only the players who are looking for employment come to Europe.

There was a special international session with questions about the development of the ELF. I can say that there is interest in the league in the USA, it is an opportunity and an alternative for many coaches. Let us remember that in the USA there is a large disparity in earnings, even at the university level. Some programs have millions of dollars, and others are not so great, and they have to compete with others, because college football is prestige and advertising, and no university will allow itself not to field a team. And football is not a cheap sport, as we know it perfectly well. It happens that in Europe you can get a better financial offer than in the USA.

Someone asked for a place in Panthers Wrocław?

I talked to the coaches I had contacted before. We still have some time to get these things done.

Together with you at the convention, was among others Łukasz Sutkowski, responsible for physical preparation in the team. How important was his presence in San Antonio?

It was very important. Physical preparation trainers also had their discussion panels, but the equipment fair was important. Not only football - helmets or coaching software. There are a lot of companies presenting new methods of fitness preparation at the AFCA, I wanted Łukasz to see it all himself and talk to suppliers, e.g. with a company analyzing GPS data, how they approach it at the high school or D1 level.

Did you use virtual reality? More and more D1 programs use special glasses for training.

There was such a stand, but I do not know if they used it [in San Antonio there were also President of Panthers Michał Latoś and Dawid Tarczyński, vice-president of Panthers, member of the board of Tarczyński SA - editor's note aut.]. But I saw a stand with glasses for receivers, which operated on the principle of a strobe - temporarily darkened and brightened the field, so that wide receivers had to catch the ball faster.

Is it worth buying such equipment? You still need to know how to use it.

That is why you need to check it for yourself, see if there are alternatives, look for inspiration. In 2019, we saw a camera stand for lifting it while recording. It turned out that the company had its warehouse in the Netherlands and we could order the rack for a reasonable amount. We use this stand in every game. These are quite expensive investments at the beginning, but we have been using them for years. Such a stand is a life saver when recording conditions are poor, there is no tall grandstand like at the Olympic Stadium, which allows for a better perspective.

Do you sleep sometimes?

I try to. I am not a person who loves the nights. A minimum of rest is needed. You have to learn how to use your time well.

How to balance family life with football, especially during the season? It is no coincidence that we talk about "football widows" who see their husbands and partners for holidays for several months of the year. Are they talking about that too?

During the convention, a meeting of the coaches' spouse is organized. They have a club in the AFCA, and they meet on their panels too. Gary Kubiak told us the story of one of his sons who joined the San Francisco 49ers in the NFL this year. He didn't want to be a coach, but he got into it and said he wanted to try. Gary said one of the most inspiring things on the trip: “no matter what industry you are in. Whether it is football or the stock market. If you want to be successful, you have to work a lot. " There is no such thing as total balance. To get to the highest possible level you need to work and devote a lot of private time. But once it's done, why not spend this time doing something that gives you a lot of satisfaction and pleasure?