Miami Dolphins made the right decision firing Joe Philbin after Week 4

Joe Philbin was fired from the Miami Dolphins on Monday morning, having just arrived back in Miami from a less than fruitful trip to London. That sentence by itself is the opposite of shocking. The surprising part of the firing was that Philbin “wasn’t worried” about his job status after meeting with Dolphins owner Stephen Ross just 24 hours earlier.

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Then again, why should that be surprising? Cluelessness was a vital component of his tenure in Miami. Philbin’s whole head coaching career was about being the last to know what everyone else could see written on the wall weeks in advance.

Let’s take this most recent season for example.

Philbin knew that his team had a problem with slow starts, and yet he did nothing about it as the Dolphins started out losing every game by 10 or more points.

Philbin knew that his team’s offensive line was less than trustworthy, and yet he refused to let Ryan Tannehill (one of the most athletic QB’s in the NFL) roll out or use his legs to gain meaningful yardage or create chunk plays with deep passes.

Philbin knew that the Bills and Jets would blitz the hell out of the Dolphins year after year. You know what he did to solve the problem? That’s right, nothing. Tannehill’s QBR is lower against those two teams than against any other in the NFL.

That is bound to happen when your coach sets you up to fail over and over again.

A head coach cant set the edge to stuff the running game like Cameron Wake hasn’t done since the second half or last season or prevent Brent Grimes’ knee injury last Sunday against the Jets, but he can set his players up for success and he didn’t do that either.

Tannehill has a chronic aversion to throwing deep passes and continually threw screens that gained two or fewer yards on second and 10. How about telling your quarterback that it is OK to take risks and make mistakes?

That was never going to happen coming from a coach who publicly stated that he didn’t believe in you after a 24-20 loss against the Green Bay Packers because he felt “queasy” passing the ball on third down.

We are talking about the same coach who didn’t pressure Aaron Rodgers in that same game’s last drive, preferring to sit back in coverage and letting the best quarterback in the NFL pick him apart.

We are talking about someone who lost control of his team and routinely has them unprepared for big moments.

When people say over and over that you are not “a true leader of men” while you look perplexed with your mouth agape on the sidelines most of the time, then you are not head coaching material.

MAKING THE SAME MISTAKES

Mandatory Credit: Brad Barr-USA TODAY Sports

In 2012, the Dolphins were 4-4 and facing a must-win game against at home against the modest Tennessee Titans. They lost 37-3 and made Jake Locker look like Peyton Manning.

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In 2013, the Dolphins were 8-6 and needed just one win to make the playoffs for the first time since 2008. They proceeded to get shut out in Buffalo 19-0 and got beat at home by a Jets team with nothing to play for 20-7.

In 2014, the Dolphins were 7-5 and hosting the Baltimore Ravens for a game with huge playoff implications. What happened? Well, they couldn’t stop the run, they let Joe Flacco complete 75 percent of his passes and lost 28-13.

In 2015, they let Redskins running back Alfred Morris look like Herschel Walker, Bills quarterback Tyrod Taylor seem Tom Brady and, most ridiculous of all, allowed Ryan Fitzpatrick to be a Michael Vick-like running threat against them.

It remains to be seen what tight ends coach Dan Campbell can bring to the table after the bye week as the team’s new head coach at Tennessee against the Titans, but the future is better for the Dolphins without Philbin.

Uncertainty is better than despair, even if the future in the short term looks bleak at best in Miami.

Hey, at least the Heat start their promising brand new NBA season in less than a month, right?

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