Miami Dolphins News

Home

Quizzes

Watch

Newsletter

Power Rankings

Who Will Survive The Dolphins Season?

Originally posted on Dolphins Talk | By Brian Marr | Last updated Sep 25, 2025 9:09 AM ET

If you’ve watched any amount of football on CBS this year, you’re probably well aware that the 49th season of Survivor is premiering this week. In the spirit of that show, I want to speculate about who is most likely to get the boot, not from the beaches of some tropical island in Fiji, but instead from South Beach. As with any team, there are a few key players who look likely to get voted off. In the case of the Dolphins, it is really three names on the chopping block.

Quarterback Tua Tagovailoa, Head Coach Mike McDaniel, and General Manager Chris Grier. In this blog, I’ll break down the likelihood of the team moving on from each person, much like I would if I were pulling you aside moments before tribal council.

Tua Tagovailoa

Once the subject of a campaign for the team to intentionally lose games in order to acquire him, now the team is tanking with Tua instead of for him. The former Pro Bowler and MVP candidate has looked like a shell of himself this season, plagued by poor decision-making and lacking what made him valuable in the first place.

So far, he has a 69.7% completion percentage, 575 yards, five touchdowns, but four interceptions. His turnovers have come at terrible times, opening the season against the Indianapolis Colts with a pick to set the tone for what would become a blowout, then sealing the game with another one against the Buffalo Bills on Thursday night football.

The case seems clear for letting Tua go; he’s not the QB we thought he could be when signing him to his 4-year $212.4 million contract ahead of the 2024 season.

Unfortunately, that contract may be what keeps him around for at least another year. His dead cap if the Dolphins were to cut him after the season would be over $99 million. It’s also unlikely that they could convince anyone to take on his $56 million-plus cap hit, either. They do have an out after 2026 with only $34 million in dead cap, but it’s not ideal anyway you slice it. So for now, Tua is safe.

Chris Grier

Chris Grier has been with the Dolphins organization since 2000, when he joined as a scout. Undoubtedly, he’s proven to be valuable and nice to work with, or else he wouldn’t have stuck around for a quarter century. Though his tenure as the Dolphins’ general manager, a role he’s held since 2016, has left a lot to be desired. The real highlight of his run was the Laremy Tunsil trade, which netted the Dolphins a plethora of picks and set in motion the 2019 tank for Tua movement.

He parlayed this move into acquiring big-name players like Bradley Chubb and Tyreek Hill, and this will be what he will be widely remembered for when his time in Miami does end. However, he will be most remembered by Dolphins fans for the players he whiffed on, like Noah Igbinoghene or Cam Smith. Both cornerbacks could have been important pieces for the team at a position of need, but failed to live up to the expectations of the spot in which they were drafted.

Grier’s choice to never really address the offensive line in a meaningful way will also count against him, as will his love for adding players with high upside but legitimate injury concerns. All of that being said, I think that he’s so deeply integrated within the organization that it is almost impossible to hope for owner Steven Ross to make the move and fire him. At best, we can hope that he moves on to another position.

Mike McDaniel

The Mike McDaniel era started off hot, with the team making the playoffs in the first two years under his leadership. At one point, he was widely regarded as a wizkid, someone who understood the offensive game at such a level that he was going to revolutionize the sport. He would be able to get Tua to play at a level worthy of the 5th overall pick that was used to draft him. For two years, it looked like the Dolphins had finally found the long-term answer at head coach.

However, last season was essentially a disaster, when Tua wasn’t playing, the Dolphins’ offense, once known as one of the most explosive in the league, was basically non-existent. Even with Tua returning to the lineup this season, the offense hasn’t looked the same.

McDaniel’s demeanor has also changed; once a fun and humorous presence at the podium, he now appears worn down by the realities of being a head coach. It seems unlikely that the Dolphins will move on from McDaniel anytime soon, but digging out of a 0-3 hole is nigh impossible. So when the season concludes, I believe that it will be his torch that is snuffed.

This article first appeared on Dolphins Talk and was syndicated with permission.

More must-reads: