A decade later, history is staring the Dolphins in the face as ownership weighs a familiar crossroads — and past mistakes threaten being repeated
Will the Dolphins learn from or repeat history?
Time really is a flat circle. For Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross, he probably can’t help but feel like he’s been here before — because he absolutely has. Ross’s franchise has a coach with an uncomfortably warm seat that is two years removed from an 11-win season but fresh off a 7-win campaign. And while Ross weighs the right path for this offseason, a star coaching candidate is on the market and in high demand. The name is Harbaugh.
Is this 2026? Or is this 2011? The story above, to this point, could be either. If you don’t remember the saga, Stephen Ross once pursued a Harbaugh in the first few years of his ownership of the team. It didn’t go well. And now Stephen Ross will have a chance to show off any lessons he’s learned over the last fourteen years as another Harbaugh becomes available as a possible upgrade over his current coach.
Dolphins owner Stephen Ross must be feeling deja vu over Harbaugh development
Back in early 2011, Stephen Ross was a relatively new owner in the NFL. And he acted like one. Ross, with a head coach, the late Tony Sparano, still under contract after going 11-5 in 2008 and then 7-9 in both 2009 & 2010, hopped on a jet and met with then Stanford head coach Jim Harbaugh about a potential fit with the Dolphins just days after his end of season meeting with Sparano. Word got out publicly, and Ross and the Dolphins organization wore egg on their face as a result.
He would go on to release a statement to season ticket holders to explain the situation:
“I met with (head coach) Tony Sparano on Monday to discuss the season and understand his plan of what needed to change as we headed into the offseason. I told him that I needed time to digest what I had heard and that I would get back to him with my thoughts later in the week. Meanwhile, I received word that Jim Harbaugh made it clear that his intention was to pursue a career in the NFL. As news reports began to surface on Tuesday that Jim was interviewing with other teams, I made the decision to reach out to Jim to see whether or not he would be a beneficial fit for the organization.
General Manager Jeff Ireland and I met with Jim on Thursday. At the end of the meeting, I thanked Jim for his time, wished him well and soon let him know that we would not pursue the discussion any further. To be clear, I made no offer to Jim Harbaugh. Reports to the contrary and the associated outrageous financial terms that were rumored with those reports were completely inaccurate.”
— Dolphins team owner Stephen Ross on January 8, 2011
Sparano would receive a contract extension from Ross to help amend the embarrassing situation, only to coach the next 13 games in 2011 (with a 4-9 record) before being relieved of his duties. Interim head coach Todd Bowles finished the season 2-1 and the Dolphins would go on to hire Packers coach Joe Philbin in early 2012 — whose experience in Miami was a far cry from what Harbaugh did with the 49ers.
Ross would revisit the Harbaugh/Sparano saga on 790 The Ticket with Dan Le Batard a few years later in 2013. He described the regrettable handling of the Harbaugh courtship as something that “damaged the whole organization” and stated that Sparano “could never put it behind him.” A final footnote for this history lesson. Ross took ownership of his role in the saga once things went public back in 2011.
“I shouldn’t have been talking to coaches until I decided that I should make a change,” said Ross at the time. Remember that. Write it down.
Fast forward to today. The Dolphins are two years removed from an 11-win season and have had a 9-loss season and a 7-win season in the two years that have followed under the direction of the same head coach (Mike McDaniel). Like Sparano, Mike McDaniel is currently still under contract with the Dolphins — although the team has afforded no public backing of McDaniel since the season ended with a 28-point loss to the New England Patriots in Week 18. McDaniel’s seat is undoubtedly warm and, to use McDaniel’s own summary from a Monday press conference, no one is happy about the product on the field.
Jim’s brother, John Harbaugh, was just dismissed by the Baltimore Ravens after 18 years, 180 wins, and the seventh most playoff wins of any coach in league history. He is, most certainly, a big fish on the coaching market. Harbaugh’s infusion has rearranged the pecking order for presumably every franchise with a coaching vacancy. And perhaps, according to reporters, some teams who don’t even have a coaching vacancy.
It would stand to reason that the Dolphins could (and they most definitely should) be among the teams interested here. But once again, the stars aren’t perfectly aligned for Miami to offer a full-court press without strings attached — at least not at this moment. Which is what makes this moment such an intriguing moment in the legacy of Stephen Ross, the owner of the Dolphins.
There is no comparing the resumes of John Harbaugh and Mike McDaniel. It is apples and oranges. McDaniel has youth and longevity on his side as the younger man. And he’s a good man — someone who genuinely cares about his players and attempts to go about his work the right way. But Harbaugh is also a good man and has sustained success, a championship background, proof of concept, experience, and culture in his corner. Maybe not in 2025 with the Ravens, but across a nearly two-decade body of work. In a cruel, ironic kind of way, John Harbaugh is generally everything Stephen Ross has searched for in a head coach while simultaneously being the opposite of every hire the team has made under Ross’s watch.
Miami has swung hard on hot-shot young coordinators like Philbin, Adam Gase, Brian Flores, and Mike McDaniel. All first-time head coaches, too.
Stephen Ross should finish what he started back in 2011. Bring a Harbaugh to South Florida. Do whatever it takes. But a whatever it takes requires something Ross didn’t have the conviction to do the last time around — make the hard choice ahead of time. Decide to make a change before talking to the coach. Before beginning the pursuit, acknowledge the flaws in the incumbent exist and it is okay to want better results and consistency from a man in charge of the team.
Maybe the Dolphins aren’t interested at all and make no pursuit of Harbaugh. I wouldn’t agree with it, not in the slightest. But I would respect it more than a half-in, half-out flirtation that cuts down your head coach at the knees. We’ve seen that before. A pursuit of Harbaugh with McDaniel still under contract would be failing to apply the history lesson from the last time around. And you know that saying about those who fail to learn from history…they’re doomed to repeat it.
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…and we are off!
