By firing the general manager of the Dolphins on Friday, a day after the team metaphorically failed to return to the field of play after halftime in a blowout loss to the Ravens at home, owner Stephen Ross activated one of several escape hatch plans in an effort to rebuild Miami.
While the knee-jerk assumption for some was that Mike McDaniel has survived the ever-familiar power struggle between coach and inherited general manager, I would caution those from considering that a realistic possibility.
Much more likely?
Why the Dolphins made the move
• Ross and the Dolphins brass don’t want the same thought processes guiding this draft class as it did the previous nine, of which Grier was a top personnel executive. With a few months left in the season, Champ Kelly, a talented personnel executive who has interviewed for numerous GM jobs over the years, will help sort out the team’s live college scouting operation.
• With an international game coming in 16 days for the Dolphins (they play the Commanders in Madrid), Ross may have preferred to keep most of the leadership intact. Defensive coordinator Anthony Weaver and offensive coordinator Frank Smith have both interviewed for head coaching jobs in the past, and both should still be considered upwardly mobile candidates in different situations. Still, Ross may have decided that he did not want an extended look at either, given that it would be wise to let a new general manager pick his own coach.
• Though the McDaniel era deteriorated into what we saw Thursday night, with McDaniel’s most unedited display of overt frustration, anger and, in some ways, apathy toward the countless stream of mistakes and miscommunications, I’m sure Ross had an appreciation for what McDaniel brought and for who he was behind the scenes. During the good years, the Dolphins consistently aced organizational tests such as the NFLPA report card, which, while covering all aspects of the club, focuses heavily on the head coach’s demeanor and emotional intelligence. McDaniel was beloved by a lot of the team’s operational staff, from IT and training to video and equipment.
• And, ultimately and most central to what happened Friday, the firing of Grier took place with the most time because it’s going to be the longest and most integral part of the process, and the new GM will more than likely want to hire their own head coach anyway. The Dolphins want to give themselves a long runway to discover their own organizational needs, vet candidates and land a top GM candidate before pivoting to the head coaching position. Rarely in recent Dolphins history has the timing of a new head coach coincided with the arrival of a new general manager, which is more ideal from an organization-building perspective.
Jumping off the latter point, the Amazon Prime Video broadcast on Thursday effectively served as a funeral for Miami’s organizational woes—a horror show for an owner who had extended television time in an isolated setting devoted to shots of fans leaving in droves and the eternally painful graphic that Miami is the league’s only team without a playoff win since the turn of the millennium.
This is why Grier was the symbolic name on the chopping block Friday and not the head coach. Ross, in my mind, is attempting to finally pacify the fans who know that merely swapping out head coaches again, when the talent pool has become so dreadfully threadbare and the quarterback situation has been whiffed on consistently since Dan Marino retired in 1999, would be a ceremonial maneuver befitting of an owner who is not consistently invested in the operation. Grier’s firing is the beginning of an overhaul. Ross likely wants that to be clear as the Dolphins struggle through the waning months of the season.
Possible GM replacements
The good news is that there is a stocked cupboard of solid general manager candidates, including:
- Ian Cunningham, assistant GM, Chicago Bears
- Alec Halaby, assistant GM, Philadelphia Eagles
- Adam Berry, vice president of football operations and strategy, Philadelphia Eagles
- Josh Williams, director of scouting and football operations, San Francisco 49ers
- Chad Alexander, assistant GM, Los Angeles Chargers
- Brandon Brown, assistant GM, New York Giants
- Terrance Gray, assistant GM, Buffalo Bills
- Jon-Eric Sullivan, vice president, player personnel, Packers
- Mike Greenberg, assistant GM, Tampa Bay Buccaneers
- Former Titans general manager Jon Robinson
- Former Jaguars general manager (and current Eagles executive) Dave Caldwell
Ross has to know that selecting a candidate—and I wouldn’t be surprised if that person is almost certainly on this list—is the only way out of the team’s recent past in which a glass ceiling of mediocrity has hung over the franchise. McDaniel, Brian Flores and Adam Gase were all playoff-caliber coaches without playoff-caliber rosters or playoff-caliber organizational alignment.
The first step toward fixing that issue took place on Halloween.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as Why the Dolphins Fired Chris Grier First—and Who Will Replace Him.