Joe DeCamillis
Getty
Denver Broncos head coach Joe DeCamillis.
It should come as no surprise that new Las Vegas Raiders head coach Klint Kubiak would go digging into his own past to fill out his coaching staff as he tries to breathe life into one of the NFL’s worst franchises.
It also should come as a surprise that Kubiak, the son of Super Bowl-winning head coach and former Broncos quarterback Gary Kubiak, might need to turn to some of his Denver ties to do so.
We got the latest example of this as Kubiak hired 60-year-old Joe DeCamillis as his special teams coordinator on Monday.
“The Raiders have now agreed to terms with Joe DeCamillis as their special teams coordinator, per source,” NFL Network’s Tom Pelissero wrote on his official X account. “DeCamillis, 60, has won two rings — including with the Broncos in Super Bowl 50 under Gary Kubiak, whose son, Klint, now brings the longtime special teams guru to Las Vegas.”
2-Time Super Bowl Champion as ST Coordinator
DeCamillis won another Super Bowl as the special teams coordinator for the Los Angeles Rams following the 2021 season. He spent the last 3 seasons on the college level, 1st as the associate head coach at the University of Texas in 2023 then the last 2 seasons as the associate head coach and special teams coordinator at the University of South Carolina.
DeCamillis actually was the head coach of the Broncos for 1 game, in October 2016, when head coach Gary Kubiak was out with an illness — a 21-13 loss to the San Diego Chargers.
The stint in the 2010s was actually DeCamillis’ 2nd time in Denver. He served as assistant special teams coach under former head coach Dan Reeves in 1991 and 1992 and is actually married to Reeves’ daughter, Dana, who he met while he was an All-American wrestler at the University of Wyoming in the mid-1980s.
Raiders Have No. 1 Overall Pick in 2026 NFL Draft
It will take a lot more than good special teams play to pull the Raiders up from the bottom of the AFC West Division, where they’re coming off a 3-14 season and own the No. 1 overall pick in the 2026 NFL draft.
Kubiak is coming off a Super Bowl win as offensive coordinator of the Seattle Seahawks and is one of the NFL’s youngest head coaches at 38 years old.
Making the task seem almost impossible for Kubiak, DeCamillis & Co. is that they’re playing in arguably the NFL’s toughest division.
The Broncos will return almost every player off a team that went 14-3 and took the AFC’s No. 1 seed in 2025. The Los Angeles Chargers made the playoffs in 2025 despite being ravaged by injuries. The Kansas City Chiefs went 6-10 but have won 3 Super Bowls and played in 5 Super Bowls since 2020 and are absolutely going to reload this offseason.
While the Raiders will almost certainly take Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Fernando Mendoza at No. 1 overall and have talented young offensive skill players in place with NFL All-Pro tight end Brock Bowers and 2025 No. 5 overall pick running back Ashton Jeanty, that’s still no guarantee they’ll even be able to field a team with a winning record in 2026 — something they’ve only done once in the last decade.