Something tells me Harbaugh isn't coming to Miami even if the job was open. It sounds like his family wants to stay on West Coast.. I'd love to see us make a run at Gus Malzhan.. but the guy I think will end up here is Bill Cowher. I think he sees we have a QB we can win with.. And a defense capable of being elite. There's also the Dan Marino connection. With Dan being so involved.. I can see him being key person to get Cowher to come to Miami. And I'd be fine with that..
I'm not a Philbin fan or Coyle fan, but like CK mentioned, I'd want to keep Lazor, Benton, etc. If we finish 9-7 or above I'd keep everyone for another year. The coaching has cost some wins but just as much is from starting a project at QB from day one. If Tannehill continues his trajectory next year, I'd guess we would be in good shape.
If someone told you at the start fo the season that Tannehill would have a rating of 93.4, that we'd be on pace for less than 40 sacks allowed, a top 10 defense, a top 10 running game and a top 10 returns team, I think we'd all have been pretty excited. I also think we'd all have thought we'd be much better than 6-5.
If history has proven anything, it's that this thread is 5 weeks too early. With 2 weeks left to go last season there probably wasn't one fan who didn't want Philbin and company back. What a difference those 2 games made on our opinion. This team has 5 weeks left to go and a lot can happen that could change our opinion. If I had to say based on today, I'd say yes, simply because Philbin is still on pace to improve on last seasons W/L. Consistency for our young developing superstar QB would be a really good thing.
A huge factor is "who would you hire instead?". Don't say Harbaugh and Malzahn; they are long shots, both in being able to hire them and whether or not they would even succeed here. Do you fire Philbin and "let it ride" on the 5% chance you get one of them? I don't see anybody else out there that is making me drool. Promote Lazor? I'd rather just keep him where he is; I don't see the net gain. (We all saw the ridiculous way the GM search played out this offseason.) Philbin has been complained about as being a glorified "overseer", and honestly he may be best suited for a VP of Football Operations role. Finally, he has the quality coordinators and coaches to make that dynamic beneficial. Lazor is a keeper, Coyle has put out a top 10 defense every year he's been here, and Rizzi gets tons of compliments from this fan base (deserved or not). Give Dennis Hickey one more year. I think most agree he's earned it. We haven't even seen what he can do when he has his influence on the scouting team for a year. Like many said, it all depends on how we end the season. Last year he was in COTY discussions before those last two games. If we end like that again, he's gone. However, currently we are almost a top ten ten team, with our three previous losses coming in close games against two top five teams, and the best defense in football.
Did Harbaugh really rip apart the offense in SF? He basically kept everyone but Alex SMith, and he even gave Smith a year to prove himself.
He installed his own offense, an offense that failed to take advantage of Andrew Luck....and now...Kap. I LOATHE his offense.
That may or may not be true of Harbaugh. Wife/family can definitely impact where someone will go, but coaches know they can't be too particular about geography. There just aren't that many west coast teams. In any given year, there may only be 1 job opening there and it might be an awful situation (like the Raiders). Right now, one has to assume the Seattle and Arizona jobs won't be open for a while. SD, at 7-4, seems unlikely make a coaching change barring a huge collapse. And the Raider job is just a disaster. Not only is it a very bad team with no established QB, but it is also an organization that has been badly mismanaged for a long time with a turnstile of coaches and a fair likelihood of moving within the next several years. I think he'd have a hard time turning down $10+ million per year (I think the top paid HC is around $7.5M now) and final say on personnel to coach a team with a young and ascending QB, a top 10 running game and a top 10 defense. Same for Malzahn. Yeah, it would be overpaying relative to the head coaching salary market, but who cares? It doesn't count against the cap. $10M is roughly what James Laurinaitis and Jason Worilds are getting in base salary this year. They're solid players, but I know I'd rather spend that money on a top head coach.
How can you say Saban was the best AND also compare records? That is trying to have your cake and eat it too.
I know this is a form to project and pontificate out loud but the season will need to play out in this crazy game we call football.. if we go 10 and 6 and make the playoffs were not gonna get rid of him and shouldn't, and imo theres a good enough chance for that to happen.
How did his offense fail to take advantage of Luck or Kaepernick. Luck was very productive at Stanford and they were 12-1 Harbaugh's last year there. With Kaepernick they were a play away from winning the SB his first year starting and a play away from goign to another SB his second year. Not sure what there really is to complain about. It is a very balanced offense, so it doesn't lend itself to great fantasy football numbers, but it's been pretty effective in real football.
I don't see how you can say he's had a better team than any of those guys coming in. I mean if you want to say that Sparano inherited a 1-15 team so he had it worse, then that shoots your argument out of the water by saying Wannifdiot or Saban inherited worse. If you want to say they had it worse, then Sparano's team shoots that out of the water. The team Philbin inherited had two great players, Wake & Pouncey. That's it. Everyone else came in or developed under his reign.
Saban has a better record under his belt in his Miami tenure than Joe Philbin does (9-7). With less talent. Even if you want to throw that out, Sparano and Wannstedt's records are better than Philbin's too.
Philbin inherited a team that was 7-9/6-10 over the previous three years under Sparano. He then was able to get rid of Henne and replace him with Tannehill, who is far superior. That alone is a massive upgrade. In that first draft he also got Lamar Miller and Olivier Vernon, as well as Rishard Matthews. In addition to Wake and Pouncey, the team he inherited also had Sean Smith and Vontae Davis (both of whom are top ranked CBs), Jake Long, Brandon Marshall, Karlos Dansby, Reggie Bush, Starks, Soliai, Odrick and Reshad Jones. All damn good players. Most were jettisoned for a variety of reasons, but they were there and available to him. I don't complain about the 7-9 first season too much because he had a rookie QB. But if by year 3 it is still a 7=9/8-8/9-7 kind of record, that is a problem. And my point was not just about the players he inherited, but the ones he was given via the draft and FA as well. This team has talent. It has had it for several years. He needs to get a W-L record that is commensurate with that talent. I think the talent he has is roughly equivalent to what Wannstedt had. Philbin has more passing game talent (at both QB and WR). Wannstedt had a little more defensive talent, but not all that much more. When he had prime ricky Wannstedt had a better back, but Wanny put up a few 10+ win seasons with Lamar Smith, and I think Philbin has had better RB talent than Lamar Smith. Philbin's OL has never been great, but the OL talent he has had has been much better than what Wannstedt had. Albert, Pouncey, and Long are all better than anyone Wanny had on the OL (Webb his first year might have been about where Jake Long was in Philbin's first year and Wanny got one good year out of Jamie Nails, but . . . )
I see that Jim Harbaugh is now considered such a "long shot" that some posters are saying it's invalid for us to even bring up his name. Uhh, sure. We'll find out just how much of a long shot he is when/if the Dolphins blow an opportunity or two over this final stretch and it becomes apparent we're not going to the playoffs.
If we finish strong and still miss the playoffs and Tannehill continues his great play I won't be terribly upset if they keep everyone. I don't think highly of Philbin but it's the devil you know, you know?
That would depend on the individual John. I have plenty of friends named John, and not a single one uses Jack as a nickname. I have never heard John Benton referred to as Jack before this thread. Maybe I am out of the loop.
The passing offense is still very inefficient (29th in the league), and that's a big predictor of winning in the NFL. Hard to be much better than mediocre with that going on.
I never like this type of thinking. Why do people always get so giddy over the idea of giving a retread coach who may or may not have won a Superbowl in the past all this power and money? Have you not seen what Hickey has done in one season???? Why give some other guy final say on personnel when we have a guy like Hickey? If we want to fire Philbin because we do not think he has the leadership skills etc to get us passed the hump, then i say let Hickey choose a HC and go from there, but why give someone full reign over a team that is on the rise with a GM who looks to be very competent? Its so irrational. Esp. for Harbaugh. Who may have more "fire" and such, but who obviously has serious issues of his own.
This would make more sense if the wife in question was looked like Eleanor Roosevelt. Or actually was Eleanor Roosevelt. She was about as much as a wife later in the relationship as Philbin is a coach.
I think if Philbin is let go then we will need to promote Lazor or risk losing him. I don't know as I think it is a very tough situation. We do have some really good coaches that we should want to keep and to me Philbin does seem like he is improving as a coach..this year has definately been his best year. We all want a really good coach and whoever it is I want them to WANT to be HC of the Miami Dolphins for the long haul...not short term. And I think Lazor just might be the guy if Philbin goes.
I am definately not happy @ 500 but it beats where we came from with Sparano. Also, Does anyone feel like Muschamp would or could make our defense better?
In this day and age, contract extensions mean little since the coach can still be fired at any time. So I'd sign him to another 2-3 years and wait patiently to see how the season plays out. If we get a playoff win, then I'd keep him around for 2015. If things turn south though, then I'd seriously consider giving Lazor an interview for HC since he will be getting offers in the near future.
Not even close....Sparano had a conservative, losing philosophy that cost us almost a dozen wins over his three years as HC. If he didn't insist on running up the middle in the 4th quarter once we took a 1 point lead, Sparano would still be coaching in Miami today. Philbin, on the other hand, plays fearless football every week. From going for it on 4th down to blocked kicks, going for strips (instead of wrapping up), and sending all-out blitzes, he plays to win every time. Completely different philosophy than Sparano and if it wasn't for Tannehill's bad learning curve under the prior OC, I think Philbin would be seen in a much more favorable light.
Fearless football every week? Take your homer glasses off, you're wrong. Half the losses are because of a conservative approach. And almost all the losses last year was because of a conservative approach. He's just as weak as Sparano.
I'm basing my opinion on what Jay Glazer reported.. But if that's false.. Ive always been a fan of Harbaugh coming..
No fire his ***, same as last year. we could be 9-2 right now easily. Teams that don't win close games *Cough Pack *Cough Detroit *Cough Denver, i'd be more confident calling that a coaching problem. As for the coordinators. I'm thinking keep them, at least Lazor one more year. I can't get behind dat Philbum.
I am sure that Ross would pull the trigger if that happened. My argument is that Harbaugh and the staff he brings will not significantly outperform Philbin and his current staff. Change if you know you will improve. Do not change just to change when you are improving.
