Miami Dolphins coach Mike McDaniel along with his spouse Katie and their daughter Ayla throughout a information convention to the brand new head coach on Thursday at Baptist Well being Coaching Advanced in Miami Gardens.
What stood out most had been the chuckles. How typically have you ever heard common chuckling throughout a Miami Dolphins coach’s introductory information convention?
Mike McDaniel can be requested about some soccer matter like his teaching tree, and he’d thank the likes of NFL coaches Kyle Shanahan and Sean McVay for making him a greater coach. Then he’d drop an added thought.
“They didn’t make me a greater father — I did that alone,’ he mentioned.
Or he was requested about his “enjoyable” persona in a bigger soccer query about his teaching model and circled again to that.
“I didn’t realize it was enjoyable — that was enjoyable to listen to,” he mentioned.
Chuckles got here once more. They weren't loud. They didn't break the laughter threshold. However there they had been — quiet, affirming chuckles about somebody who doesn’t sound like a so-serious soccer coach. Or act like one. Or appear like one, both, his small body behind thick-rimmed glasses.
“I wrote on the within of my Little League helmet I'd be within the NFL in some unspecified time in the future,’ he mentioned. “I didn’t say I’d play in it.”
God, I hope this works.
Witty? Good? Enjoyable — with soccer?
In some methods, that is the other sport most groups play in hiring coaches and the Dolphins are long-versed in. Out goes a wunderkind offensive thoughts like Adam Gase, so in comes a dictator defensive persona like Brian Flores. Out goes Flores’ humorless persona, so in comes a coach who hears reporters’ questions preceded by a welcome and …
“That’s my fifth ‘Welcome to Miami,’ and I’m feeling welcome,’ he mentioned. “I’m simply ready so that you can bust out the lyrics of ‘Welcome to Miami.’ ‘’
Once more, chuckles. Is he a head coach? Can he command a room? Is he prepared, at 38, to be the face of a corporation? Who's McDaniel on a area the place 53 gamers and a pair dozen coaches must be managed?
You’re not going to get these solutions the primary day. However this must be a home-run rent for the Dolphins if he's to assist steer them out of continued mediocrity and a franchise below authorized hearth from Flores. McDaniel sees no challenge over proprietor Steve Ross being accused of providing $100,000 for Flores to lose video games.
“No crimson flags,’ the brand new coach mentioned.
No cause why he would. He signed a life-changing contract within the neighborhood of $30 million. This was a milestone day for McDaniel, his first head-coaching job. His eyes teared up, as he talked about these closest to him. There was his long-time good friend within the entrance row, then his spouse, Katie, with their 16-month-old daughter.
“We’ve come a good distance,’ he mentioned to Katie. “We've a protracted method to go.”
Her eyes had been misting now.
“Don’t do this to me,’ he mentioned. “I’m attempting to do a press convention.”
For many of soccer, the dictator coach model of Invoice Belichick has dominated the sport. Now a Brat Pack of the likes of McVay, Shanahan and Matt LaFleur is attempting their imprint. McDaniel is a part of that. He went to Yale.
“I do know Yale has sick athletes …” he mentioned.
He grew up on twenty seventh Avenue in Greeley, Colo.
“And we discover ourselves on twenty seventh Avenue right here,’ he says of the Dolphins’ facility.
If it takes intelligence to have humor, McDaniel additionally understands his function. He advised of teaching Houston Texans receivers at 23 — which means teaching Houston’s nice Andre Johnson. That’s the place he found, a “easy method,’ he mentioned.
“You determine early you could assist them with their dream,’ he mentioned. “In case you set up with them early on you've worth to their aim, you may coach them.”
That’s true — for essentially the most half. Gamers additionally react otherwise. Some react properly to mental teaching. Some react to the cracked whip of a lion tamer. A place coach can do this a technique. A head coach must have each instrument within the field.
McDaniel involves the Dolphins at a clumsy second. Flores was fired after two profitable seasons. The Dolphins’ mind belief that was attempting to dispatch quarterback Tua Tagovailoa 4 months in the past now loudly says he’s their man.
Ross, too, is centerpiece of an embarrassing lawsuit from the previous coach whom he launched with the identical hope three years in the past that he did McDaniel. Ross didn’t take questions Thursday. He did say McDaniel was right here to be a part of a Dolphins group, “profitable Tremendous Bowls … [pause] …. first we've got to win our convention and division video games.”
Nobody chuckled there. That’s the flat fact. Everybody seems to be good on Day One. Joe Philbin seemed sage. Gase seemed new-age. Flores seemed robust. McDaniel seemed witty and clever sufficient to convey chuckles.
Let’s hope this fashion works.