The Miami Dolphins reportedly are set to conduct second interviews with Mike McDaniel and Kellen Moore early this week as they continue to search for a new head coach, but the candidate to watch remains Jim Harbaugh.
There has been no reported formal interview involving the Dolphins and Harbaugh, but sources indicate the possibility of Harbaugh coming to Miami is very real and getting closer to reality.
Ross vowed during the press conference to announce the firing of Brian Flores that he would not be the man to take away Harbaugh from the University of Michigan, where the business school bears his name, but the reported discussion between Harbaugh and the Minnesota Vikings over the weekend has given Ross an out, so to speak.
With Harbaugh having spoken to the Vikings, now Ross can later say he didn’t take Harbaugh away from Michigan because Harbaugh already was looking to get back to the NFL.
And, based on a report Monday from ESPN insider Adam Schefter, Harbaugh isn’t considered a serious candidate for the Vikings opening.
In case you’re skeptical of the Harbaugh possibility because he hasn’t been publicly identified as a candidate through national reports, he’s the favorite to become the next Dolphins head coach at 1/2, per BetOnline.ag, followed by McDaniel at 3/2 and Moore at 4/1.
Harbaugh’s interest in returning to the NFL has been out there for about a month and Ross already went after him in 2011 — when Dolphins coach Tony Sparano was still under contract — before Harbaugh instead took the job as head coach of the San Francisco 49ers.
Landing Harbaugh would be a big coup for the Dolphins based on his track record, starting with what he did during his time as 49ers head coach.
In four seasons in San Francisco, Harbaugh compiled a 44-19-1 record for a .695 winning percentage that ranks fifth in NFL history behind only those of Guy Chamberlin, John Madden, Vince Lombardi and George Allen.
Harbaugh inherited a team that went 6-10 in 2010, led the 49ers to a 13-3 record in his first season and had San Francisco in the Super Bowl at the end of the 2012 season.
It’s also worth noting that Harbaugh helped Alex Smith reach another level as a quarterback. Smith had a 72.1 passer rating in 54 career games before Harbaugh arrived, and that figure was 95.1 in his two seasons under Harbaugh.
While the perception might be that Smith’s career took off when he moved to the Kansas City Chiefs, let’s point out that in five seasons with that team, his passer rating was 94.8.
So if the idea is for the next head coach to work with Tua Tagovailoa, who does have some similar traits to Smith, then Harbaugh certainly would seems to be a good fit.
Which brings us to a potential stumbling block if Ross indeed wants to hire Harbaugh at this time, and that’s the issue of control.
National reports suggest that the Dolphins want their new coach not only to work with Tua but also to retain most of the defensive coaches, and it’s fair to wonder whether someone with Harbaugh’s credentials would be OK with that.
Then there’s the issue of collaboration and communication, a point of emphasis during Ross’ Jan. 10 press conference, because (fair or not) Harbaugh has the reputation for not exactly being the easiest guy to work with or for. In that sense, he might be kind of like, you know, Brian Flores.
Would Harbaugh also demand personnel control and would Ross be agreeable to that? And where would that leave GM Chris Grier?
So there definitely are questions to be answered and issues to be discussed if a Harbaugh-Dolphins marriage is going to happen.
But even though what’s been put out there is that the next Dolphins head coach will be either McDaniel or Moore, it’s still entirely possible, if not likely, that it instead will be Jim Harbaugh.
