The Miami Dolphins have interviewed and requested interviews for more than 10 potential candidates. Two of them have been Head Coaches in the NFL, Robert Saleh and Kevin Stefanski. Each and every other candidate would be a first time NFL Head Coach. In case you haven’t been paying attention, former Baltimore Ravens Head Coach John Harbaugh has all but signed a contract with the NY Giants to be their Head Coach, and is therefore no longer available. As the Dolphins conduct this very thorough search, there’s potential that some of these candidates are signed by other teams as there are 5 other Head Coach vacancies, the Baltimore Ravens, the Pittsburgh Steelers, the Atlanta Falcons, the Las Vegas Raiders and the Cleveland Browns. To be fair, the Steelers and the Ravens, two of the very best NFL organizations would have to have a leg up on the competition as each of their last Head Coach’s tenure lasted nearly 2 decades ), 19 years to be exact. On the flip side, our Miami Dolphins have gone through 6 Head Coaches during the span that both Mike Tomlin and John Harbaugh were with their respective teams. If a candidate is looking for stability, Miami isn’t the place. If they’re looking for a team with a great young QB, they’ll have to look elsewhere. If they’re looking for a team with a great roster that is flush with caps space, once again, they’ll have to look somewhere else.

Thankfully, there are only 32 Head Coaching jobs in the NFL, and at this moment, there are only 6 Head Coaching jobs available. Miami most certainly has fantastic weather, no state income tax, and an owner willing to pay to win, so the salary for any potential Head Coach here will not be an obstacle. I spend a lot of time on our Dolphins, but I’m not going to tell you that I spend a lot of time watching every other NFL team and have identified the best Head Coach candidate for the Dolphins. I’m not going to use AI either (Sorry Markey!). I do have a day job that occupies more than enough of my time, so I won’t profess from my vast or really non existent knowledge of these candidates who the right guy is. That doesn’t mean, however, I don’t have preferences. I do, and for various reasons that I will tell you about.

I’m not against hiring another first time Head Coach. That being said, I’d say my first preference would be Kevin Stefanski. Stefanski seems like a no nonsense type of guy, and as usual, teams flip from one type of personality to the other end of the spectrum. Where Mike McDaniel rewards a player for having a “good practice” by allowing them to choose the music they play at practice, with Stefanski it’s unlikely they even get a pat on the back. It’s expected, demanded even that players practice well. I would put Robert Saleh, not only as the other guy with Head Coaching experience, but as a bit of a hardass and no nonsense approach. He’s not there to be the players friends, he’s there to get them ready for each game and assure that they understand their assignments and how and when to do them. Anthony Campanile, our former LB Coach also strikes me as that type of guy. I like all of them, but Stefanski would be my top choice due to his experience and success as a HC.

The next tier of guys are Klint Kubiak, OC for the Seattle Seahawks, Chris Shula, DC for the LA Rams and Jesse Minter, DC for the LA Chargers. Not going to lie, there is some romanticism when you think of having Don Shula’s grandson here as a successful Head Coach, it’s a great story. He’s a little raw, but the DNA is there, and the name is all over the history of the Miami Dolphins. Klint Kubiak has done an excellent job with Jets castoff QB Sam Darnold and a young no name WR corps. Jaxon Smith-Njigba is now a household name, exploding this season into one of the NFL’s best WR’s with nearly 1800 receiving yards and 10 TD’s. Jesse Minter ran the 9th best defense in scoring allowing only 20.0 PPG and did so with a No Name defense led on the D-line by a couple of Dolphins castoffs, Teair Tart and Da’Shawn Hand. Chris Shula had the 10th best defense in points allowed with 20.4 PPG right behind Jesse Minter’s Chargers. Shula took a young defense with some excellent recent draft picks such as DE’s Jared Verse and Braden Fiske and safety Kamren Kinchens. Now that Jon-Eric Sullivan is in place, there’s some hope that we can start hitting on draft picks, rather than wallow in misery as in 2nd year OLB Chop Robinson evaporating before our eyes, Jonah “TWOPICKS” Savaiinaea, or maybe it should be “toothpicks” as it seems that’s what it seems like his arms are as he’s routinely pancaked and turnstiled by defenders. We need talent on this roster, and we need a coach that can make the most of it.

Back to Robert Saleh, who unfortunately for him, was hired by the New York Jets, where players and coaches alike go to fail. Yes, that’s like a guy standing in a glass house throwing rocks at his neighbors, because let’s face it, we’re right there with the Jets, always. So if we discount Saleh’s failure with the Jets as being with the Jets, Saleh is a guy who continues to have success with his defenses, and this year, he did so without a talented defensive roster. The leader in sacks with only 4 was DL Bryce Huff. DE Nick Boas was lost for the season early on in Week 3, and despite not sacking QB’s, the Niners had a staggeringly low total of 20 sacks, and for perspective, our toothless Dolphins defense had 39 sacks, but allowed a lot more points than the Niners defense. Saleh is a good coach, and he will get another opportunity as a Head Coach soon, maybe even this season, and maybe with the Dolphins. We’ll see.

On to new GM Jone-Eric Sullivan, or “Sully”. Sully has his work cut out for him, and his first order of work is identifying a Head Coach he can work with seamlessly and one that he believes will have success here in Miami. We have an awful lot of holes right now, the CB’s we signed off the scrap heap are free agents, so their success last season doesn’t help us much. CB’s that are signed for 2026 are as follows. Storm Duck (who is recovering from a season ending knee injury), Julius Brents (who has a torn MCL and meniscus injury), Jason Marshall who is healthy but started only 1 game. Isaiah Johnson tore his ACL in practice in late December (not back in ’63) but may or may not be available for the ’26 season. Jason Maitre is also on the roster but a PS squad only player who hasn’t yet played in the NFL. Th,th,th,th, that’s all folks! Once again you can thank former GM Chris Grier for doing a wonderful job with the roster and the cap. Complete failures in both respects. So Sully has to remove talent in order to add it, and that likely means the departure, either by cut or trade of OLB Bradley Chubb. Chubb is due to make $23.9M next season and we can’t afford that. I hope we’re able to trade Chubb, we could use the cap space and picks too, but he might have to be a post June 1st cut in order to free up space if the latter can’t be done.

The O-line, a perennial discussion here in Miami still needs work. While LT Patrick Paul and OC Aaron Brewer seem to be inked for their respective positions, LG Jonah Savaiinaea, RG James Daniels who played all of 3 snaps for the Dolphins is a huge question mark coming off of two major injuries in a row. So Markey will tell you it’s just bad luck, but when you continually draft or sign in free agency players with injury histories, or even coming of a major injury, you then put yourself and the team in jeopardy. Well, Chris Grier lost on Jeopardy and will most likely never be a GM again after his disastrous performance in Miami. Oft injured RT Austin Jackson who played only 6 games in 2025 and only 8 games in 2024 means he’s played 14 of 34 games in the last 2 seasons. It seems the O-line will once again need to be addressed with potentially 3 spots in question for 2026.

The D-line is a better story, although not a great one. 1st RD pick Kenneth Grant was below average this season but showed some growth overall. His rookie line mates actually exceeded his play, both DT’s Zeek Biggers and Jordan Phillips, Biggers a 7th RD pick and Phillips a 5th RD pick. We’re also really set at ILB with both All Pro LB Jordyn Brooks returning along with Tyrel Dodson. At OLB, tis a sad story. Chop Robinson was practically useless in 2025 contributing 21 tackles and 4 sacks as his snap counts diminished in his 2nd season from 53% to just 44%. We have to hope whomever is HC and the DC they hire can find a way to turn that around. With so many holes to fill, you’d have to think Chop is going to play a lot of football next season. At safety, bringing back Minkah Fitzpatrick, who played well last season for us, and then potentially we’ll see if Dante Trader Jr. who flashed some last season can grow into a starter.

On offense, the big ugly void at QB is staring right at anyone who takes this job. Sorry, you can’t look at this roster and think we’re going to have QB Tua Tagovailoa under center in 2026. If whomever is hired disagrees, I may have a breakdown. The best financial path is to have a competition at the QB position, Quinn ewers would be one guy and I’d love to draft another QB in ’26, not necessarily Day 1 or even Day 2, but a player who can provide competition and have potential to start if necessary. Listen, I’ve said it a bunch of times, if Tua Tagovailoa wants to get himself into awesome shape and come in here with the attitude that he’s willing to play to win, not to “not get hurt” and put his body on the line within reason, then I’m cool with him being part of the competition, but nothing can be handed to him, no way, no sir! He must earn that spot, and in addition, the other 2 QB’s on the roster MUST BE PREPARED TO PLAY, because even if Tua wins the job, how long he lasts if he does play to win, or how poorly he plays if he doesn’t, the other fellas better be ready to go!

WR and TE are two glaring holes. You have to believe that WR Tyreek Hill and his bloated salary has played his last game in Miami, if not the NFL altogether with such a gruesome knee injury. Jaylen Waddle is pretty much middle to bottom as far as #1 WR’s go. We definitely need talent to add to Waddle and the two Washington’s (Malik and Tahj), as well as resurrect Nick Westbook-Ikhine, and then develop Theo Wease. Malik looks like a solid slot WR, but we need someone to threaten the defense on deep balls and red zone balls like 50/50 balls. I though NWI was that guy, but McDaniel could never get him involved after having a career year with the Titans in 2024 with 9 TD’s.

Once again, Sully has a tough assignment ahead of him. He must identify the the right Head Coach candidate and then hopefully that candidate accepts the job. Then he has to find the time to comb through the roster and the cap situation and get prepared for Free Agency, where we can only pick up scraps as we are OVER THE CAP right now. He has to evaluate the roster and prepare for the upcoming draft and form a draft board with his new Head Coach, but ultimately, Sully will be responsible for the draft and making those choices with input from the HC, but the choice is Sully’s to make and will reflect on him and him only. It’s one of the reasons I’m so pleased we cleaned house, there will be no finger pointing here, one man is responsible, the wait it has to be. In that regard, we have done well, and I pray as a long time Dolphins fanatic, that we continue to make good choices

GO DOLPHINS!!! GO SULLY!!!