Kelly: Dolphins Would Benefit From Adding a Graybeard to Coaching Staff

Mike McDaniel needs to give serious consideration to replacing former defensive coordinator Vic Fangio with a veteran head coach like Ron Rivera or Leslie Frazier

Say whatever you’d like about Vic Fangio, but he’s viewed as one of the greatest defensive minds in this era of football.

His resume is impeccable. He’s well respected, and what I liked the most about the 65-year-old was that he’s a veteran head coach who Mike McDaniel could have, and should have, leaned on for guidance.

The best thing about the old is they hold wisdom.

Whether Fangio wanted to share that wisdom or preferred to grumble something to McDaniel is a different story, one I don’t have an answer to.

But now with Fangio on his way to Philadelphia to become the Eagles' new defensive coordinator, I’d argue that there’s a need for McDaniel to add another graybeard, an elder with head coaching experience, to his staff.

While I’ve got a tremendous amount of respect for in-house defensive coordinator candidates like secondary coach Renaldo Hill, who served as a defensive coordinator for two seasons with the Los Angeles Chargers, and linebackers coach Anthony Campanile, who interviewed for the New York Giants’ defensive coordinator vacancy, neither has been a head coach before.

Why is that important?

Because the young don’t know what they don’t know.

HOW A VETERAN COACH COULD HELP MIKE McDANIEL

As smart as McDaniel is, the Yale product doesn’t know what challenges are on the horizon throughout a season. And just because he's coached the Dolphins to two winning seasons, and two playoff berths, doesn't mean he won't faces challenges that are unique and new to him.

But maybe they won't be new to a graybeard.

Wouldn’t it be nice if McDaniel had someone on his staff to turn to for guidance in times of crisis. Maybe they could help him handle getting play calls in quicker, fixing Miami's troubles staying healthy in December and January, or how to strategize when wind conditions impacted offensive performance on one side of the field for a playoff game, like it did in Miami’s loss to Kansas City?

These are all riddles McDaniel hasn't solved yet.

The aged, the seasoned, the mature possess plenty of wisdom, and that’s why I’d recommend McDaniel’s next defensive coordinator choice possess some head coaching experience.

Not only can a defensive guru like former Carolina Panthers and Washington Commanders head coach Ron Rivera, or former Minnesota Vikings Leslie Frazier head coach, or New York Jets and Buffalo Bills head coach Rex Ryan help McDaniel tighten the screws on the NFL’s 10th-ranked defense, they can also provide McDaniel some coaching guidance, knowledge, history, feedback that presently isn’t available on his staff.

There’s nobody around to teach McDaniel how he should handle when a vital leader like Christian Wilkins is upset about the franchise not coming to terms on a multi-year deal.

Or when a defensive star like Jalen Ramsey is bothered by how he was utilized all season, and begins to shut down. Maybe a graybeard can help McDaniel massage the ego of a rookie like cornerback Cam Smith, who spent all season in one of his coaches' doghouse and didn’t play.

While this is a different generation of players, one that’s far more sensitive than the generation that just passed, and often struggles with hard coaching and criticism, coaching is coaching. And a graybeard should be able to share his experiences, the lessons he learned from his mistakes and successes, providing McDaniel’s context for the crisis he encounters on the daily basis.

Even though running backs coach Eric Studesville was an interim head coach for the Denver Broncos and quarterbacks coach Darrell Bevell was an interim coach for the Detroit Lions in 2020, being a head coach for a month doesn't cut it.

And neither does being a head coach for two seasons.

At this point, with this staff, the only person McDaniel can turn to for that type of wisdom are people who have never been in his seat before, and his peers, who have their own fires to put out on their own teams.

If McDaniel wants to take the next step as a leader, a coach, a mentor, a play-caller, he should find himself someone he can lean on for wise counsel, someone to serve as his yoda.

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