Why Brian Griese left television booth to become 49ers’ quarterbacks coach

SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Brian Griese spent his entire adult life either playing football or talking about it on television. Both jobs had been at the center of the Griese family business for the better part of 55 years, but in February, Griese suddenly found himself at a crossroads.

His time in the Monday Night Football booth was ending after two years, with ESPN hiring what Griese calls a “bigger fish” in Troy Aikman to become the sole analyst. And while lucrative TV deals were almost as prevalent as large player contracts during the NFL offseason, Griese didn’t have time to wait to see if one of those offers would materialize if he wanted to pursue a career path that had always been in the back of his mind.

That is how Griese ended up at dinner with San Francisco 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan and his staff on an early March evening. Only a couple of days earlier, Griese reached out to Shanahan through intermediaries in Denver, including Kyle’s father, Mike Shanahan, to express interest in becoming the Niners’ quarterbacks coach.

Although Griese, 47, had no previous coaching experience, Kyle Shanahan was intrigued. He had interviewed multiple candidates but had known Griese for about 25 years, dating back to Griese’s time playing for Mike Shanahan with the Denver Broncos in the late 1990s and as an offensive assistant for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 2004 and 2005, when Griese was a player for the Bucs.

The dinner offered a chance for Griese and the Niners’ staff to get to know one another, talk about football, life and how he might fit into the San Francisco dynamic. More than that, it was a chance for Shanahan to find out how invested Griese was in such a dramatic career shift.

“Brian was very successful, has a family out in Denver, hours change a lot and they all say they know, which he does, but it…