Vic Fangio on what went wrong in Miami

[CF DolFan]

Vic Fangio on what went wrong in Miami:

“Nothing really. Up until the last couple of games, we were ranked very high in defense. We were top 5 in every stat. Then we lost 6 or 7 starters over last few games”
@PFN365
 #SuperBowl

Kind of funny that a "grumpy old man" didn't throw our lazy, undisciplined, players under the bus.

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

According to this Dolphins were the 23rd most injured team.

So healthier than most.  If you can only win with no injuries you can't win.

https://www.statmuse.com/nfl/ask/2024-most-injured-nfl-team

[Spider-Dan]

"If you ignore the beginning of the season (when the defense couldn't stop the Chargers or the Bills) and the end of the season (when the defense couldn't stop the Titans or the Ravens), the defense was actually really good"

[Spider-Dan]

According to this Dolphins were the 23rd most injured team.

So healthier than most.  If you can only win with no injuries you can't win.

https://www.statmuse.com/nfl/ask/2024-most-injured-nfl-team

This data is busted.

The link you provided is for 2024 (not 2023 when Fangio was in Miami), which you can see by the team W-L records.  But if you change the URL to 2023, the records change but the list is in exactly the same order.

[Phishfan]

According to this Dolphins were the 23rd most injured team.

So healthier than most.  If you can only win with no injuries you can't win.

https://www.statmuse.com/nfl/ask/2024-most-injured-nfl-team

Not that I disagree with your point but that isn't the correct season.

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

I thought we were talking about this year.  Didn't know you guys were still making excuses about the prior year.  But that year you were 23 as well.

[Spider-Dan]

I hope you aren't using that same site as "evidence" of the rankings, because - as I just explained - unless the numbers for "most injured team" were precisely identical from '23 to '24, that data is wrong.

[Sibster]

Vic Fangio on what went wrong in Miami:

“Nothing really. Up until the last couple of games, we were ranked very high in defense. We were top 5 in every stat. Then we lost 6 or 7 starters over last few games”
@PFN365
 #SuperBowl

Kind of funny that a "grumpy old man" didn't throw our lazy, undisciplined, players under the bus.

Sounds eerily familiar to the 1993 Dolphins who were winning left and right with Scott Mitchell.   They had a 9-2 overall record, beat Dallas on Thanksgiving Day, and had the number one seed in the AFC.   Then they lost a bunch of defensive starters including Troy Vincent and Marco Coleman and proceeded to lose their final five games and miss the playoffs entirely.

[CF DolFan]

Fangio also played nice when asked about the differences between the Miami and Philly organizations.

“It’s just a whole lot different. The whole organization top to bottom. It’s just different. Not to say one is better than other.” - Vic Fangio via David Bearman, Pro Football Network

[Downunder Dolphan]

Vic Fangio on what went wrong in Miami:

“Nothing really. Up until the last couple of games, we were ranked very high in defense. We were top 5 in every stat. Then we lost 6 or 7 starters over last few games”
@PFN365
 #SuperBowl

Kind of funny that a "grumpy old man" didn't throw our lazy, undisciplined, players under the bus.

Fangio's smart enough not to burn those kind of bridges, especially if he may be in line for a head coaching gig somewhere in future.

The last thing he needed to say was something like "the owner is a demented old fart, the GM was clueless, the coach was a dope, and the players were a bunch of spoiled brats". Anything like that will come back to bite, regardless of how true it may be or not.

[Dolfanalyst]

One has to think Fangio's experience of the Dolphins' team culture was analogous to his being a restaurant manager who tried to get his employees (i.e., the defensive players) to be dedicated to the job and give high effort, only to be undermined by the restaurant owner (i.e., McDaniel) who frequented the establishment as a silly drunk who permitted the employees to behave similarly.  Nobody would want to persist in that capacity under those circumstances.  All he needed to do was make a move to a team with a better leader and a better culture and the struggle to get players to be serious and dedicated disappeared.

[Downunder Dolphan]

Fangio also played nice when asked about the differences between the Miami and Philly organizations.

“It’s just a whole lot different. The whole organization top to bottom. It’s just different. Not to say one is better than other.” - Vic Fangio via David Bearman, Pro Football Network

As well as being diplomatic about the organization, he pointed out how specific injuries had derailed us at the end of the season:

https://dolphinswire.usatoday.com/2025/02/04/vic-fangio-dolphins-defensive-coordinator-nothing-really-eagles/

“Up until the last couple of games, we were ranked very high in defense. We were top five in every stat. Then we lost six or seven starters over last few games.”

Dolphins players that went down in the latter half of the regular season included Bradley Chubb, Jaelan Phillips, Andrew Van Ginkel, Jerome Baker, and Xavien Howard. In Miami’s playoff loss against the Kansas City Chiefs, the team was forced to start Duke Riley at inside linebacker, Eli Apple at cornerback, and Melvin Ingram at outside linebacker.

By the time we got near the playoffs, we were just signing guys off the street to make up a full squad for defense. I remember Ingram looking totally out of shape and struggling to finish the game out. Referring to injuries is usually seen as a crutch, all teams have to deal with them, but in this case I think there's some merit.

[Spider-Dan]

One has to think Fangio's experience of the Dolphins' team culture was analogous to his being a restaurant manager who tried to get his employees (i.e., the defensive players) to be dedicated to the job and give high effort, only to be undermined by the restaurant owner (i.e., McDaniel) who frequented the establishment as a silly drunk who permitted the employees to behave similarly.

There is no evidence that McDaniel interfered with how Fangio ran the defense in Miami.

All he needed to do was make a move to a team with a better leader and a better culture and the struggle to get players to be serious and dedicated disappeared.

Also, Fangio had to start caring, which he didn't do in Miami.
Having superior defensive talent (that remained healthy) didn't hurt.

I seem to remember that PHI made the Super Bowl two years ago, before Fangio was the DC.

[CF DolFan]

Philly has a lot of great young talent who bought into Fangio and played disciplined football. Miami has guys who think they are the stars and didn't care for him. It was known that Ramsey and others would freelance. The results speak for themselves.

[Dolfanalyst]

There is no evidence that McDaniel interfered with how Fangio ran the defense in Miami.
Also, Fangio had to start caring, which he didn't do in Miami.
Having superior defensive talent (that remained healthy) didn't hurt.

I seem to remember that PHI made the Super Bowl two years ago, before Fangio was the DC.

A head coach will inherently interfere with a coordinator if the coordinator needs a serious, dedicated approach from his players to run his unit, and the head coach, who has more organizational power than a coordinator, establishes a lax, silly team culture in which the players in general aren't sufficiently serious and dedicated and accountable.

It's not that the head coach is "tinkering" with the defense and interfering in that way -- it's that he's establishing, intentionally or unintentionally, a team culture that keeps the coordinator from having the ingredients he needs within the players to be successful.