00:00Chris Perkins is on the Toyota of Hollywood hotline.
00:04Before we talk football, I remind you the best place to get geared up is
00:07Canesware in Davie or online at canesware.com.
00:12Chris Perkins, a columnist for the Sun Sentinel, writes about the Dolphins.
00:16Dolphins have a new GM.
00:18Now they've got a new head coach, both of them from the Green Bay Packers.
00:23Maybe a lot of people missed the news yesterday because it was kind of a big
00:27day in South Florida for football as it was.
00:30Do you think that was intentional, Perk?
00:31It wasn't how it was going to start, but Perk, do you think that was intentional
00:34to kind of let it fly under the radar or, hey, we've got them here and the other
00:40NFL teams don't care about when you announce a hire and we're not going to
00:44give anyone a chance to hire the guy who we want.
00:47So, so be it.
00:48It's national championship night, but we've got to make our announcement.
00:52That was it.
00:52That was it, Hawk.
00:53You know, look, the story was that Jeff Halfley was on his way to Tennessee today
00:59and he was one of the three finalists for the Titans job.
01:04So really, I think what it got down to for the Dolphins was don't let this man
01:10out of the building without a contract or without an agreement.
01:14And so that's basically what it came down to.
01:17You know, I wish they would have just let UM have the stage alone,
01:20but the world doesn't operate that way.
01:23It looks like we've lost our connection to Crowder.
01:29What do we know about?
01:31He had said that he wanted the next question, but then he froze on the screen.
01:34What do we know about Jeff Halfley?
01:36I mean, we know it comes from Green Bay, defensive coordinator.
01:39Like, what do we know about him?
01:42We don't know a whole lot about him, Hawk.
01:44I think that the reason that I give this a thumbs up right now is because it looks
01:48like John Eric Sullivan, the GM, has conviction in this hire.
01:53Yeah, it's kind of a brother-in-law hire, right, that they worked together for Green Bay
01:57for the last two seasons.
01:59But it appeared that John Eric Sullivan never flinched when Sean McDermott got fired by Buffalo.
02:06Now, maybe McDermott had no interest in the Dolphins' job, but it appeared that the Dolphins were like,
02:12no, Halfley is our guy.
02:14I know McDermott is available, but Halfley is our guy.
02:17I don't know how it went down in the seven-person hiring committee, Hawk.
02:22And that's one thing that I want to find out.
02:24Was this unanimous?
02:25Was it a majority decision?
02:28Did John Eric Sullivan just kind of cowboy the process and say, my boy, it's going to be our choice?
02:34What did Troy Aikman think?
02:35Did Troy Aikman have a big voice in the final say?
02:38I kind of wonder how it all went down.
02:41But the fact that it appears Sullivan showed some conviction in his boy, he didn't flinch
02:46when McDermott came up, it makes me think that there's more conviction in this than meets the eye.
02:52And Park, do you like the defensive hire?
02:56Because my thought was the quarterback, like you see the Ben Johnson, you've seen, you know,
03:00all that other thing, like the defensive guy, I was a big offensive guy fan.
03:07Yeah, no, you know what, Crowder, what I wanted more than anything was the mentality
03:12and the attitude that this guy brings to the team and to the organization.
03:17Because I think the Dolphins under Mike McDaniel and Chris Greer,
03:20there was a lot of participation trophy mentality.
03:24There was a lot of let's be popular type stuff.
03:27I want a team that's bringing hard hats and lunch pails to work every day.
03:32I think a lot of your defensive coaches have that type of mentality.
03:36There's some offensive coaches, you know, Sean McVay and all that.
03:40But I like kind of that Tomlin Flores,
03:43Mike Brable type of mentality that defensive coaches seem to bring.
03:48So with me, it wasn't so much are you offensive, are you defensive, do you have experience,
03:53are you a first-time coach?
03:54Bring a butt-kicking mentality to that franchise.
03:58That, to me, is the number one thing by far.
04:02Perk, this is the eighth straight head coach that the Dolphins hire
04:05with no previous head coaching experience in the NFL.
04:09Why would this be any different than the previous eight that ultimately didn't have success in Miami?
04:18I think, you know what, Solano?
04:20We're seeing a lot of success in a lot of different fashions right now, right?
04:24Liam Cohen had no experience in Jacksonville.
04:27Ben Johnson had no experience in Chicago.
04:30Mike McDonald in Seattle.
04:33That's another defensive guy, by the way, Crowder.
04:35So, you know, we're seeing it done different ways.
04:38Now, look, Aaron Glenn was a total disaster up with the New York Jets, right?
04:43But we are seeing it done a whole lot of ways.
04:46You don't have to have the experienced guy.
04:48You don't have to have the guy who has a Super Bowl like Mike McCarthy, right?
04:52He's still out there.
04:54You don't have to have anything.
04:57You just have to know how to make it work for your team and your situation.
05:02That's what I think is kind of exciting about what we're seeing in the NFL right now is that, you know, this is a landscape where you had coaches like Mike Tomlin and John Harbaugh unemployed at the same time for a brief period of time.
05:19You have quarterbacks like Patrick Mahomes and Lamar Jackson and Joe Burrow not in the playoffs.
05:23You're seeing some unknown guys do stuff and make their name known, Bo Nix, even though, you know, we know him, but he doesn't have very many skins on the wall.
05:33So I think the coach thing goes along with that, Solana, that we're seeing a lot of different ways to win.
05:40And so even if he's a first-time coach, that shouldn't be a deterrent.
05:44Just make sure you have the right guy.
05:46And, Perk, you bring up Bo Nix, and we know who's going to the conference championship games, you know, the quarterback names, and who was playing last weekend.
05:57With Tua, Perk, what do you think – what should happen – I'll ask it this way.
06:01What should happen and what do you think will happen with having a $50 million quarterback that got benched and a backup quarterback that got overpassed in Zach Wilson by a seventh-round quarterback?
06:12And, Quinn, you were – like, this quarterback situation is crazy, and it has to be settled before the season starts next year.
06:21You know what, Shannon, this is interesting.
06:23So this was my column today that hasn't posted yet.
06:26I asked, can you connect the dots to Malik Willis, the Green Bay dots, right?
06:30John Eric Sullivan, Jeff Halfley, Malik Willis, who's going to be a free agent.
06:36I'm sure that Green Bay is going to make him a priority to re-sign, but should the Dolphins pursue him?
06:41And my thing is, you don't have to find your quarterback, your franchise quarterback, in 2026.
06:48Maybe you find him in 2027.
06:51But what I think should happen, I think they should cut Tua loose and make him a post-June 1st cut, absorb the $99 million in two years, $67 million this year, $32 million next year.
07:02You bring in a starter to compete with Quinn Ewers for the starting job.
07:08You do still have Cam Miller, the recently signed Cam from North Dakota State, on the roster, too.
07:14But you bring somebody in to compete with Quinn Ewers.
07:18If you want to draft a quarterback in the third round, okay, go ahead.
07:22I'm not drafting one in the first and second rounds because of who's available and my desire to build up the trenches.
07:28And then I see who's out there in the free agent market as far as quarterbacks, Crowder.
07:33But I let them play it out this year.
07:35This just doesn't seem to be the year to get married to a quarterback, either through free agency or the draft.
07:41So I let this season play out.
07:44I build up the trenches.
07:45And I put more of a priority on the quarterback in 2027 than I do in 2026.
07:51Do you think this whole search worked out the way that Stephen Ross envisioned, Perk?
07:57And I think I've brought this up to you before.
08:00I think if he really had planned on getting rid of Mike McDaniel, he wouldn't have been letting him do exit interviews.
08:07I think there would have been kind of this, hey, let's all take a deep breath for a week.
08:12Let's shelve the exit interviews.
08:15We'll start them a week later.
08:16Let's all recalibrate.
08:17We'll meet several times and we'll decide what the future is.
08:21I feel like he kind of made a rash decision when John Harbaugh became available.
08:26And I think he had so many voices in that room.
08:29You talk about the committee of seven that maybe he got, I don't want to say bullied, but maybe got cajoled into making some changes that he wasn't really prepared to do.
08:41And if I said to you, when it's all said and done, he's going to end up with, what's his name?
08:47John Eric Sullivan?
08:49John Eric Sullivan and Jeff Halfley.
08:54I don't think Stephen Ross would have been happy with that or signed up for that.
08:59I think he would have been fine with the status quo before a couple of, you know, hey, we'll give a shot to these two guys we've never heard of.
09:06You know what, Hawk?
09:07I think you're right.
09:08Yeah, here's to me the most disturbing thing about this whole situation.
09:14It's not that, you know, the story that Darren Waller told us how Steve Ross came in while Darren Waller was having his exit interview with Mike McDaniel.
09:24I'm sure Mike McDaniel through his time has had to cut guys in very awkward fashion.
09:30These things don't always happen in a clean fashion.
09:32My bigger concern is that Mike McDaniel still had a job on Thursday, like you say, Hawk.
09:39He should have been fired the morning of Black Monday.
09:44I don't see why Steve Ross was going to keep Mike McDaniel.
09:49And that is what worries me about the dysfunction in this organization.
09:52And it still exists.
09:54I don't know if they can overcome the Steve Ross dysfunction.
09:58That's just a flat-out bad decision.
10:01You were going to keep Mike McDaniel for whatever reason?
10:04You told the guy that he was going to have input on finding the next GM, and now all of a sudden he doesn't?
10:11Something – this just doesn't smell right.
10:14So, look, I'm happy that they ended up eventually doing the right thing and making the clean sweep
10:21and that they have some familiarity with the Green Bay GM hiring his boy from Green Bay as the head coach.
10:27That all kind of locks into place.
10:29We'll see what happens.
10:30But, Hawk, I'm kind of with you.
10:32I don't think this is what Steve Ross envisioned.
10:34I think clumsily and shamefully and regretfully he envisioned Mike McDaniel still being the head coach.
10:42That really, really worries me.
10:45And, Perk, you brought up Liam Cohen where now the, you know, Jaguars, what do they have, 13 – 12, 13 wins?
10:53Like, he turned it around.
10:55Is that our hope?
10:56Is our hope that Heffley comes in and turns the team around just like Liam Cohen did his first year?
11:01That's what we're shooting for.
11:03Yeah, yeah, that's what you're shooting for.
11:05But you also need some staying power, though.
11:08So, you know, look, the window is probably only open for three or four years, as we're seeing in Detroit, right?
11:15Because it's not just that players go up and down and their contracts, you know, get more expensive.
11:22People start taking your coordinators, right?
11:25Ben Johnson was their offensive coordinator.
11:26He's in Chicago.
11:27Aaron Glenn was their defensive coordinator.
11:29He's with the Jets.
11:30So, with the Dolphins, you know, let's see – you know, we'll see with Jacksonville how long it lasts.
11:36We'll see in Chicago.
11:37Washington came up very quickly, right?
11:39But then Jaden Daniels gets the elbow injury, and we'll see what happens there.
11:44Houston, C.J. Stroud, what's happened to him?
11:47So, that's the first step, Proud.
11:48You want to get off to a good start because we do see these one- and two-year turnarounds.
11:53But then after that, can you maintain?
11:56Can you stay on the top?
11:57You don't want to just see this splash in the pan.
11:59And so, it's a multi-layered thing, but you're right.
12:02The first step is getting off the starting line like Ben Johnson or Liam Cohen did,
12:07and then you take it from there.
12:09And, Perk, Anthony Weaver, he's interviewing for head coaching jobs.
12:13The new coach is a defensive coordinator.
12:16Is there any way that Anthony Weaver's here and also Heftley?
12:20Like, it doesn't make sense to me to keep the coordinator when you're bringing your defense in.
12:25I think it seems like they just want to break with the pass,
12:28which, you know, that doesn't hook up with the Mike McDaniel being around on Thursday.
12:34But, you know, look, you fired your GM.
12:37You fired your assistant GM.
12:38You fired the two co-directors of player personnel, right?
12:41Adam Ingroff and Anthony Hunt.
12:43So, you wanted to clear out the scouting department.
12:46You're probably going to part with Tua.
12:47You're probably going to part with Tyree.
12:48So, I think Weaver would probably be caught up in that sweep, Shannon,
12:54that you just part with the old in almost every way that you can,
13:00and you get a new mentality.
13:02You get, you know, new guts of the team, new people that you're going to rely on.
13:06No more Tua.
13:07No more Tyree.
13:08And you just figure out a brand new way of doing it.
13:11I think Anthony Weaver gets caught up in that wave of change.
13:16True or false, Perk, next season is shaping up just to be a boring, uninteresting season.
13:22Oh, it better not be.
13:23Like, look, again, look at how all these programs turned it around in Washington
13:28and Chicago and Jacksonville, Denver.
13:32Like, no, no, no, no, no.
13:35That's the mentality I'm talking about, Hawk.
13:37You cannot have a GM and a coach come in here and go, well, I guess we got to reset.
13:42No, no.
13:44Get out of my office with that crap.
13:45You see what these other franchises have done.
13:48You need to get this team to the playoffs by 2027.
13:51Not that somebody's going to be fired if you don't, but that's the mentality you need.
13:56That needs to be one of your intermediate goals on the way to winning a Super Bowl.
14:01Get this team to the playoffs by 2027.
14:04Don't accept any.
14:05Well, you know, we don't have a quarterback.
14:07Bump all that noise.
14:09That means somebody can pass them.
14:11It's easier said than done.
14:13They're hamstrung by the cap.
14:15They have a.
14:16I don't want to hear all that mess.
14:17I don't want to hear all that mess.
14:19But you have to hear it.
14:21Mentality.
14:22You have to hear it.
14:23Mentality.
14:24We're not accepting participation trophies anymore.
14:27Mentality.
14:28I'm telling you.
14:29Don't accept that mess.
14:30That's the problem with this franchise.
14:32You have to accept reality, though, don't you?
14:34I mean, it's nice.
14:35What was Jacksonville's reality a year ago?
14:39That's fair.
14:40You've got a 35-year-old GM and a first-time head coach there.
14:43You've got Trevor Lawrence making $50 million that he probably shouldn't be making, and you
14:48still make the playoffs.
14:50Get to the playoffs.
14:52Well, I think their best chance is to have Tua as their starter.
14:55See, that's a winning mentality, huh?
14:59That's what I'm talking about.
15:01Tua can get you there.
15:02That's it.
15:03Turn that world upside down, baby.
15:05There you go.
15:06I don't know.
15:06You've got me all confused.
15:07Perk.
15:08You've got me all confused.
15:08I know he does, but Perk brings it up.
15:10I got to ask him, because Perk brings up Trevor Lawrence, who was the guy that got the
15:13big deal and wasn't being successful.
15:15But our big deal quarterback, our money quarterback, we benched, Perk.
15:21Like, you have to, I'm not on the lose thing, but we have a $50 million quarterback that
15:28we decided not to put in the game for the last couple games.
15:32No, Tua can't be part of it.
15:34You know, I bring up Trevor Lawrence.
15:36They had a defense to help him, right?
15:39To help him make his life a lot easier.
15:42Tua's not part of the future.
15:43Tua's got to be gone.
15:45I bring that up just kind of joking, you know, but look, Trevor Lawrence is not a $50 million
Be the first to comment