MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — Mike McDaniel has run out of luster in sunny South Florida.
The Miami Dolphins fired the dry-witted, wunderkind coach who they once viewed as the future of the franchise on Thursday, ending his four-year tenure that was defined by soaring — and unfulfilled — expectations.
McDaniel fell out of favor after a 7-10 season in which Miami missed the NFL playoffs for a second straight year.
“After careful evaluation and extensive discussions since the season ended, I have made the decision that our organization is in need of comprehensive change,” Dolphins owner Stephen Ross said in a released statement announcing the move. “I informed Mike McDaniel this morning that he has been relieved of his duties as head coach.”
Miami’s move brings the number of NFL head coaching vacancies to eight. The Arizona Cardinals, Atlanta Falcons, Baltimore Ravens, Cleveland Browns, Las Vegas Raiders, New York Giants and Tennessee Titans are the other teams currently without a head coach.
The Dolphins went 35-33 under McDaniel, reaching the playoffs in his first two seasons but losing in the first round each time. Miami missed the playoffs in the 2024 season after being eliminated by the New York Jets, a fellow AFC East team, in the regular-season finale. This year, their postseason hopes ended with a loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers in Week 15, ensuring that their 25-year drought without a playoff victory would continue.
“When I took this job, I had a vision of a team that was bonded together and played with passion and energy on the path to winning championships,” McDaniel said in a released statement. “I gave everything I had for that goal. I’m disappointed, especially for the fans, that we did not have better results on the field.”
Miami parted ways with longtime general manager Chris Grier on Oct. 31 and began its search for a new GM this week. A disjointed finish to the season in which quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, a former first-round pick, was benched proved the final straw for Ross on the McDaniel era in Miami.
“I love Mike and want to thank him for his hard work, commitment, and the energy he brought to our organization,” Ross said in his statement. “Mike is an incredibly creative football mind whose passion for the game and his players was evident every day. I wish him and his family the best moving forward.”
McDaniel, 42, arrived in Miami in 2022 after one season as offensive coordinator for the San Francisco 49ers. Credited with adding inventive wrinkles to the 49ers’ run game, the first-time head coach was billed as the creative mind who, along with Tagovailoa, was supposed to lift the Dolphins out of years of mediocrity.
Initially, things appeared to be heading that way.
McDaniel won 20 of his first 33 games, including a 3-0 start during his first year with wins over the Ravens, who have been playoff regulars for most of their existence, and the Buffalo Bills and the New England Patriots, two fellow AFC East Division teams. He took the Dolphins to the playoffs that season and nearly beat the Bills with rookie Skylar Thompson starting in place of Tagovailoa, who was out due to a concussion.
McDaniel’s off-the-cuff jokes, idiosyncratic sayings and flashy style were a refreshing deviation from the approach of many other head coaches, but they were also initially met with needed results on the field.
Tagovailoa credited McDaniel with rebuilding his confidence as a young NFL quarterback after Brian Flores, McDaniel’s predecessor in Miami, tore it down. Tagovailoa said last year that the constant criticism early in his career left him doubting himself. He was the fifth pick in the 2020 NFL draft and won the starting job, but he was benched twice as a rookie and faced uncertainty his second year amid speculation the Dolphins were seeking a trade for Deshaun Watson, who was with the Houston Texans at the time.
“To put it in simplest terms,” Tagovailoa said in a 2024 interview on “The Dan LeBatard Show,” if you woke up every morning and I told you you suck at what you did, that you don’t belong doing what you do, that you shouldn’t be here, that this guy should be here, that you haven’t earned this right. … And then you have somebody else come in and tell you, ‘Dude, you are the best fit for us, you are accurate, you are the best.’ How would it make you feel listening to one or the other?”
With McDaniel tailoring Miami’s offense to his strengths, Tagovailoa led the NFL’s top offense in 2023, throwing for a league-best 4,624 yards and 29 touchdowns. He led the league in 2024 with a 72.9% completion rate.
Since that season, which ended in a 26-7 loss in a frigid wild-card game to the host Kansas City Chiefs, the Dolphins have gone 15-19, and they appear far from the franchise that just a couple of years ago spoke of contending for a Super Bowl.
They haven’t won a playoff game since 2000, the longest active drought in the NFL. And they have made headlines more for culture issues in the past year than on-field success.
Tyreek Hill, the star receiver the Dolphins acquired from the Chiefs in 2022, took himself out of the 2024 regular-season finale and later told reporters “I’m out,” expressing frustration with not making the playoffs for the first time in his career.
Hill — who suffered a season-ending knee injury in the fourth week of the 2025 schedule — later apologized, walked back those comments and stated his commitment to the Dolphins. However, his actions seemed to reflect behind-the-scenes trouble for the Dolphins in 2024, which included instances of players repeatedly showing up late to meetings.
McDaniel, Grier and veteran players said during the offseason that many of those issues had been addressed, and they commended the new team camaraderie that they hoped would help them get off to a fast start in 2025.
The Dolphins opened the season with a 33-8 drubbing by the Indianapolis Colts and ended it with another blowout loss to New England. Now they head into another offseason of uncertainty.
“Eventually, like everybody else in this league, you’re not entitled to this position,” McDaniel said Monday. “If I’m not able to win regular-season games, playoff games and Super Bowls, eventually the job won’t be mine.”