Mike McDaniel's Road to Becoming Dolphins Head Coach

The Miami Dolphins continued a distinct pattern when they hired Mike McDaniel as head coach Sunday, though they obviously hope the end result will be different.

Just like Adam Gase and Brian Flores before him, McDaniel joined the Dolphins as a young first-team head coach long on NFL experience.

In fact, when it comes to prior NFL coaching experience, McDaniel is right near the top of the list among all Dolphins head coaches.

Not counting his one year as an intern with the Denver Broncos in 2005, McDaniel spent 14 years as an NFL assistant before joining the Dolphins, and that ranks as the second-highest total prior to becoming Miami head coach behind only the 18 years of experience that George Wilson brought to the job when he became the franchise's first head coach in 1966.

At 38, McDaniel is the third-youngest head coach hired by the Dolphins after Flores and Gase, who both were 37 and both had worked in the NFL as assistant coaches for 11 years — Flores had prior NFL experience in the scouting department.

For those looking to keeping track, the Dolphins head coach who arrived with the least NFL coaching experience was Jimmy Johnson with five years, but those five years had been spent as head coach of the Dallas Cowboys and two of them ended with him holding a Super Bowl trophy.

THE SHANAHAN COACHING TREE

Besides his vast NFL experience, McDaniel also has had the opportunity to work alongside and for several successful NFL head coaches as part of the Mike Shanahan coaching tree.

That tree has produced head coaches Art Shell, Gary Kubiak, Anthony Lynn, Kyle Shanahan, Sean McVay and Matt LaFleur. McDaniel worked with all of them except for Shell and Lynn.

Of course, McDaniel was part of that talented offensive coaching staff with Washington in 2013 when Kyle Shanahan, McVay and LaFleur also were part of Mike Shanahan's staff.

It's also very noteworthy that Kyle Shanahan respects and trusts McDaniel so much that he made it a point to bring him along when he was hired as offensive coordinator for Houston in 2008, Washington in 2011, Cleveland in 2014 and Atlanta in 2015 before Shanahan brought him along to San Francisco in 2017 when he was hired as 49ers head coach.

"Obviously, I don't want to lose Mike," Kyle Shanahan said last week. "I think people made a bigger deal out of Mike this year because he had the (offensive coordinator) title all by himself. But Mike did the same thing this year he has been doing the last five years. So Mike's always been such a big part of what we do here. Yeah, he always focuses on the run game. That's his area of expertise, but Mike helps me in all aspects of offense. We brought Bobby Slowik, who kind of took a little bit of (New York Jets offensive coordinator Mike) LaFleur's role. But that didn't change what we do with Mike and he was just as big in 2019 and as he is this year. So Mike's always been good at what he does. He always will be and he deserves to get some of these opportunities people are talking about."

THE INDIVIDUAL HIGHLIGHTS UNDER McDANIEL

-- After his NFL coaching career was sidetracked more than a decade ago because of a drinking problem that McDaniel addressed during the week of Super Bowl LI, McDaniel spent two seasons as running backs coach for the Sacramento Mountain Lions of the UFL and he helped RB Cory Ross earn UFL Offensive Player of the Year honors in 2010.

-- After two years as an offensive assistant with Washington, McDaniel became wide receivers coach in 2013 and that year Pierre Garcon set a franchise record and led the NFL with 113 catches.

-- In his only season with Cleveland in 2014, McDaniel again served as wide receivers coach and that year Andrew Hawkins posted career highs with 63 catches for 824 yards.

-- Fullback Kyle Juszczyk was selected to the Pro Bowl in each of McDaniel's five seasons in charge of the 49ers running game after making the Pro Bowl once in four seasons with Baltimore.

-- Running back Raheem Mostert, who had had brief stints with the Dolphins and four other teams before joining the 49ers, ran for a career-high 772 yards in 2019 and then set an NFC Championship Game record with 220 rushing yards in a 37-20 victory against Green Bay.

WHAT THE STATS STAY

Where the 49ers ranked in the NFL with their running game in McDaniel's five seasons as run game coordinator or offensive coordinator:

2017 — 21st in yards per game; 17th in yards per attempt

2018 — 13th in yards per game; 12th in yards per attempt

2019 — 2nd in yards per game; 9th in yards per attempt

2020 — 15th in yards per game; 16th in yards per attempt

2021 — 7th in yards per game; 16th in yards per attempt

Interestingly, the 49ers had a different rushing leader all five seasons: Carlos Hyde, Matt Breida, Raheem Mostert, Jeff Wilson and Elijah Mitchell.

It's also very noteworthy that in McDaniel's first and only season as 49ers offensive coordinator, more than half of the starters on offense were selected to the Pro Bowl: fullback Kyle Juszczyk, wide receiver Deebo Samuel, tight end George Kittle, and linemen Trent Williams, Alex Mack and Laken Tomlinson.