http://www.forbes.com/sites/joshkat...changes-the-six-worst-moves-of-the-past-year/ "2. The Dolphins keeping coach Joe Philbin — twice" I know Philbin isn't the most liked coach after bullygate and the Dolphins going 8-8 the past two seasons but I'm not sure I ranked that as #2 because he won't impact our franchise as long term as some of the other moves. Philbin is sandwiched between John Fox and Jim Harbaugh leaving their teams which are bigger moves because of the level of success they've had. 8-8 is better then the 7-9 and 6-10 we've been the past 4 seasons before that. Keeping Ireland as long as we did was a bigger mistake I think Ken Whisenhunt choosing to coach the Titans is a much bigger mistake on the their list.
This deserves to be #1 in a normal off-season, if not for some of the more insane coach/administration issues of this year. But I'm glad someone is saying this in a magazine Ross might read.
Gotta wonder about Doug Marrone. He went from Bills Head Coach to apparent shoe-in for the Jets HC position, to interviewing with other teams, to now having to interview for the Jags OC position. Talk about settling for less. Guy must've really sunk his reputation after his divorce from Buffalo.
I hear the guy is a power nut. He wants full control and for a guy who hasn't accomplished much, that seems to be a bit of a reach. Front Office's were probably turned off after they met the guy. As for keeping Philbin, Stephen M. Ross is our owner so nothing will ever be 'normal' as long as Stephen M. Ross is owning the Dolphins. The guy knows nothing about the sport.
Makes sense on its face but some pretty well-regarded coaches have been at the helm for some had late-season collapses. This year it happened to Harbaugh and Kelly. It happened to Shula in '93, going from 9-2 to 9-7 and out of the playoffs. Parcells had a few. Carroll had one or two with the Jets and/or Pats. JJ had one here in 1999 (8-2 to 9-7). Etc.
And speaking of the "magical" Jim Harbaugh lots of people have wanted to coach the Dolphins, notice that when he had only two Pro Bowl players and his QB played at about an average level, his team went 8-8, the same as the Dolphins, who also had two Pro Bowl players and a QB who played at about an average level.
1993 happened after both Marino and Scott Mitchell, among various others such as John Offerdahl, were out for the season. It wasn't a collapse so much as uncontrolable erosion.
To me it should be number 1. Keeping Philbin makes absolutely no sense. Especially when all it does is prolong the rebuilding process which will now have to wait at least one more season. The biggest surprise for me this year will be if Philbin actually makes it through the entire 2015 season without being fired sometime during the season.
Fun fact: Philbin is the only head coach in the NFL who's coached at least three years and never had a winning season. Only he and Jeff Fisher of the Rams have been at their current jobs the last three seasons without a winning one in that span.
Best quote from article, "Ross has confidence in Philbin. Therefore, I have confidence Miami won’t make the playoffs in 2015 either."
Nice, and meanwhile Philbin has managed to have what looks like a quality quarterback yet still managed to keep the team about the same as circa Chad Henne.
Whisenhunt...damn what an idiot. Honestly the Titans are like 3 years of good drafts away from being relevant. Not a smart move. I tend to agree with all of those moves. The Marrone move was right up there too, I think he didn't understand that the NFL owners stick together, he over played his hand.
I heard the same on Sirius NFL radio. I forget who it was, I think it was Vic Carucci talking about the fact that Marrone had the out clause, and used it as a power play to get more authority in personell. The Bills apparently weren't interested in giving him more authority, and Marrone walked, thinking he could get more elsewhere. Yup, I think it's safe to say his power play in Buffalo failed, apparently he thinks higher of himself than NFL teams to from a head coaching standpoint. Pretty crazy little story there. As for the Forbes/Philbin thing... I can't say I disagree with it. Hopefully this helps Ross realize what a fool he was about this decision.
At least we should only have to put up with one more year of this guy, unless we make the playoffs which I wouldn't mind either. Hickey is going to have a lot more to do with the long term success or failure of this team than failbin anyway.
Parting ways with Harbaugh should be number one by a mile, and not just for the year but for the century. Then 2 to about 23ish should be all the teams that didn't attempt to sign Harbaugh. Then you've got the Eagles creating animosity with Chip Kelly. Only then can you start looking at the organizations that decided to stick with potentially mediocre coaches for another season, of which there are probably about 10 of them. According to my coaches rating system these were the 5 worst coaches from last season: 1. Dennis Allen 2. Jeff Fisher 3. Mike Smith 4. Jason Garrett 5. Mike Tomlin Sticking with any of those guys could have been looked at as a big mistake last year, but what's worse, sticking with a guy like Dennis Allen a year too long or firing Mike Tomlin a year too soon? I would say its a much bigger mistake to fire a guy too soon. I think we'll probably have another mediocre season next year but you never know, its been 30 years since we've sniffed a SuperBowl, whats one more year? P.S. If Foles would have stayed healthy I think its highly likely Garrett is on the unemployment line instead of signing a 5 year extension. I predict that if Romo can even come back he'll miss a lot of time and that team is going to be awful, Garrett won't survive more than 2 seasons.
It'll be interesting to see if this gets Ross upset. I remember he was irked when PFT had Miami listed at 32 in the preseason Power Rankings last year.
I think the Cowboys success can be attributed more to their assistant coaches than Garret. Linehan is an outstanding OC and Callahan is known for putting together stout OLs. Marinelli also worked wonders with their depleted defense. Just an overall very good coaching staff.
So maybe all we really need to do is bring in some outstanding assistants to take some of the work load off Philbin. Head coaches now have to be delegators right, so we can just find more assistants with head coaching experience.
We'll know for sure by this time next year whether the move was a total failure or a stroke of genius....i'm hoping for the latter.
Well, there's at least a chance he'll read it since it's Forbes. He certainly doesn't seem to read anything about football, given his decisions.
Good article. Not sure I agree, but still food for thought. I have a feelig we could marshall far more examples where hanging on through delay and indecision worked out poorly than examples where it paid dividends but hell, I'll just wait and see what happens with Philbin next season. Then we'll know for sure.
it kills me to see the dolphins continuation of a downhill slide and the reason it bothers me that the pregame and post and some half time games ignoring us and only us tells me no one like this organization and they don't have any love for droppy dog Ross. it kills me because we will be revisiting this issue next year too. what are the odds of us finishing last in the division next year. Mr Ross was at one of the jets games before our last game which mean he is tanking the dolphins on purpose and if we were smart we should petition the nfl to force big ears to sell this club . but the fins fanbase wont stand up for anything because all of the other clubs fans don't let this crap go on for very long with their teams. I miss Wayne H. he was class and the people in the league respected him , I cant say the same for Dumbo .
BTW, I like to say "Stephen 'M.' Ross" because I don't want to insult (or confuse him with) any of the competent Stephen Ross' in the world.