joining us. Now. First year
head coach, the Miami Dolphins and 17-year member.
I'm told of PFT Planet. He's Mike McDaniel,
Mike. Well, I'm
sorry. I'm not there in person. I had no idea. I had no idea.
You've been a reader, the website for so long. I'm very
pleased,
my heart. I was thinking. No, I was thinking that, like,
you know, maybe I've made it. Being a head coach, but you
don't make it as a head coach until you sit at the desk with
both. These guys not just one. So
I'll keep working
and hopefully I learn it down the line. Hahaha.
That's a great answer.
Hey,
when did it first really sink in for you that you had made
it? That you're going to be a head coach in the NFL that your
dream that you've been pursuing for.
All these years was finally realized. When's the moment
that it you really allowed it
to T realising your brain that you finally reached
the Mountaintop,
you know,
it's a great question because it really
I wouldn't say that it has sunken
because
it was wild that first afternoon getting all
the onslaught of calls, right? Because it
you have all these people that are participating in your in
your journey. The the whole way
that
are rooting for you but it's not like you hear from every
day and then all of a sudden there's an onslaught of people
from you know, every Walk of Life that you've had and who
want a job from you
know, there's some of that. Yeah, there's also just people
just invested that it was like, sure you realize that, hey,
I've been rooting for you. There's some guy that's been
telling another guy in a bar that
my name is actually worth a crap and then they've been
like, yeah, whatever dude. And then like you get a proven,
right? But all of those, But then
immediately after that,
the next morning I wake up
and it's just a transition
in your job responsibilities. But
you're also for me, I've just been like, you know what, my
job is kind of transferred to a different scope of serving more
people.
So
that that whole thing is all-encompassing so there's
been a really silly Vibration, there's not
the sink in part. It's just like,
I'm doing the same job more expansively, right.
Reaching more people,
more of a
priority on serving people because I can actually Empower
them if they can make decision, right? But it's the same
approach. I think that you have to take and how you got there
and just doing a daily job. Yeah. So what that amounts to is,
I'm really busy every day. Yeah,
I have Learned from all of the,
you know, the the people that we've known watched do this,
right? It's first time head coaches and I've been my peers.
Yeah to expect the unexpected.
But I think the most surprising thing is I get super tired by
the end of the week. Yeah. I just like your like your diet,
your dad because you're just, you're on the, you're on the,
on the ball all the time
and it's the decision. Like my wife will ask me like
white or wheat bread. No bag.
Oh, yeah, you Make the decision. I've been making
decisions all week. That's been the only real deal. Otherwise,
you know, I've been, I've been so fortunate to be around a lot
of really good
coaches that,
that I've worked with and been peers with and watch them, go
through all this. So I feel like I had added advantage
in this first month. That's where I want to go with you
right off the bat. Just because I mean, yeah, Kyle, I mean,
you've been a longtime friend of Kyle as I write and
Kyle's trusted you with everything. You're almost an
To him, but you guys are different people to write. So,
like, talk about a little bit like, you know, the things you
you might take from Kyle and maybe, you know, what's the,
the Mike McDaniel, Twist on things, how you
approach it your way. Well, the,
you know, one pillar that he hit me up with
when he was
when he was getting after me as a 22-year old, when he was 26.
And, and trying to shape me mm
in a direction that
he thought would benefit me
was just the Idea of being yourself and being being
authentic
and that players see through any sort of front that you put
on,
right?
So that in itself.
I guess. I'm like Kyle and I'm My Own Self. Yeah, but I am
very different
in terms of just how we go about our
day to day lives. And I, you know, I have a random dry sense
of humor.
He he
Is wild and crazy, more know. He's
when he gets adrenaline. We're gonna talk that way. Yeah, he
gets adrenaline going. He has a
little bit more of an internal temper, right? Whether he
chooses to express it, as, you know, sometimes he does
sometimes it doesn't. But I think I'm a little more
even Keel in that regard, right,
but it's just a different,
a different presentation, but I would hope that people People
would say at the end of the day that my attention to detail for
my job is,
is very similar
that
you know that my style and swag is probably better. Definitely,
Maybe. He did have that coat. He's definitely not. No. Well.
Yeah,
but now he's got, he's gotten better. He's like fine wine.
He's fine wine. Yeah, and everything they do. They just
because his hair is gray on his chin now, so it looks like it.
Wait, but what? I want to piggyback off of something.
Because that was the next thing I want to ask you
and I kind of fell coaches. Is it can be kind of cookie cutter
with
the way they are. As far as the way they act, you know what?
You are different from Kyle. You're a little bit more
cerebral dry sense of humor. What is it in your life that
has given you the confidence to kind of be that guy?
There's been some video footage of me is like a 70 year old
with pierced earrings. And like when I was young,
my,
my, my mom was driving me with ambition and like
really gave me the reins to my own life, probably, too young,
right? I was like, 14 and like I had the answers. Yeah,
which was cool. Until I had to like face the world or at least
go to college. And I was humbled hard and fast, right
but
Never really followed. I never had a cookie cutter.
I never had something to follow. Yeah.
Yeah. Got so I went under everything with the pretense of hey,
you know, I just proach this my own way, right?
And when I was younger, I people can tell me things and
I had to learn the hard way
and that and that really, you know, conversations that come
up where,
you know, I had bumps in the road my career,
those were functions of that, right,
but in that process, you just learned that
I don't know. I just
kind of had a go. Yeah, and I got that like
if you really care about what you do, if you care about
people and you, you're trying hard
that
people will Embrace whatever it is people Embrace authenticity.
Yeah, and
so I didn't really pattern my any, any part of my life after
anybody else.
I've been called random.
Sometimes call me cool. Most do I think now there's a lot of
there's people that say that I'm nerdy. I'm like,
what's a nerd? I don't get that
your - cool. Your nerdy, cool. I mean, it's cool to be a nerd.
Is sometimes right, right, I successful nerd. Yeah. I'm not
sure
that's when it goes to another level. Yeah, so
whatever it is, I think
that's what's done it. Yeah, and then I work with people
that Empower me. I got hired
by an owner and a GM that Like embracing
that, you know,
and no one standing right there and she's a the reason I don't
have my foot in my mouth. Yeah, every day, right head of PR and
she she makes
she steers me in but says, you know, be yourself every once in
a while and so it's it takes a village.
You're funny. Yeah,
it does it early. Yeah.
Hey, Mike. I'm looking at your background and now he's still.
Here is the
I've just been enjoying the conversation from most coaches
when you start going through the early years of their life
you begin to see the seeds at a minimum
of where this is all heading,
but history major at Yale.
At what point for you?
Does this world open up? Does this desire? Begin to grow
where this is the way that you want to take your life because
it could have gone in a bunch of different directions.
No, that's a, that's a good question. So it was there
before I went to college. But then I was at,
you know, there's so many ambitious people at a school
like Yale or
that are driven and
and you're like,
you know, looking at
people that are 27 28 years old
that aren't I Banking and
New York City and
I'm deciding whether or not, I can forward Pizza with with, or
without pepperonis. They like, man. Yeah,
go get some money.
Then you do. I tried some I baking stuff
in the summer and I was like, wow, I'm going to be terrible
at this because the bottom line was.
I wanted to be. I wanted to be
I wanted to be able to feel like I could be a lead at
something that I did and I knew
when push came to shove in business,
I would end up
not getting the best deal for myself.
Because I, the idea of taking
And money off of somebody else's play at some point. I'd
given I wouldn't be that get a business. So then I'm in
college and I'm like,
You know what? I need to go into football. So about my
senior year,
I decided that I wanted to go into football. And then when
I was in New Haven as a senior,
a 22-year old, I'll try to,
I'll try to quote it to the best of my ability, but my,
I put together a resume,
and I think the career objectives said
to
what was it.
It was basically I just
It was it was something to the
to the regard of being a Hall of Fame in FL head coach.
That brings
brings a team multiple championships.
I was 22 in New Haven and hadn't coached at any point. So
but like in my walks of life, I kind of realized that.
The best way to get the mat to Max up, maximize, whatever you
have going on is to set your ceiling as high as possible
and you might not get there. But if you're tough enough to
handle the, the failures or perceived failures,
you're going to get the most out of your
out of yourself.
So,
you know, I did that from,
that's the whole reason I even applied to heal and the first
place that I had envisioned to be an NFL coach and then what
When I did my first resume that I sent to Mike Shanahan that
I'm sure he was like,
okay, dude, whatever.
But, you know, the the line I think, I think Jeff Darlington
quoted it or something,
but it literally was like, to be a Hall of Fame and I thought
I had coach and bring somebody multiple championships and
that's just the way. I see
really everything in life. If you're tough enough to handle
the failures. It's really The
Fearless that can
go after greatness.
And what else am I doing? If I'm not trying to do that?
We can continue this conversation. All day long.
It's fascinating to me. We do have to let you go. Let's do
it. I mean, push everything back. Ha ha, ha.
I got nothing going on.
I got one more, very important question
because I am a huge, huge, Dennis Green fan and you, you
are, you have a probably only guys under 40,
who can say I worked with deaf screen,
you were with him in the UFL,
with the California Franchise, the Sacramento mountains. Lines
and give me give me your best. Dentist green story.
Um,
there's a store, okay? To be twofold because there's a piece
of wisdom that
really shaped this whole Dolphins experience that I've had.
That's one of the reasons I speak. So passionately about
the, the support staff and the building
and all the employees in the Dolphins organization. Was that
Danny Green planted this seed. He said any player or anybody
that touches your players in NFL organization, anybody that
touches them on a date?
Basis
has to feel as though when you get fired. They get fired
and I don't take that as literal as much as it. The
point was
that they have to be invested
in you as much
as you're invested into the team. Because the
and he and then in my career. I've seen it in six different
franchises. This being the 7th
trainers, Take You Down
video Department, Take You Down,
And
Personnel department and its death by inches. So that was
his piece of wisdom. My favorite story was
classic random Denny.
It was the like game day. We're playing. I think we're in,
we're playing at the Giants stadium
and we're at some place off of
the 101 in Northern California,
and he comes down for the pregame meal.
and he's like,
what about the guy
that invented the curved shower railing?
He's not gonna think about it because we have all these
places and you're staying in the shower and you're,
you know, you got that all that soap, scum on the shower drape
and it's touching you and then somebody just has the thought
curve the shower, really?
And that was like
him, eyes, dad anywhere. He was always looking at stuff
and just being like,
Is evaluating it?
Oh, yeah. No. And
you know, I've been fortunate to work with guys that have
worked with him as well.
He and people don't have any idea what type of offensive
innovator before use a head coach. But in the process of
all the
mic,
all that bill lost tree, how really
he was revolutionary in his process, but then became a head
coach and we knew him for his for his presence and how
he Ran stuff, but he also just changed. When he went to
the Vikings. He changed his whole offensive system
made it into digits because he was like,
I don't want to be like everybody else, right? That is
pretty cool. I think.
Yeah.
Hey Mike, this is pretty cool. And it's great talking to you.
And hopefully, this is the first of many times. Anytime
you want to come hang out with us. You're more than welcome.
Yeah, other times. I'll be there in person. I promise.
So are time at any time
at any time anybody you want and it's right, but you know
what this is, this is recorded to write. This is, we're gonna
be on TV tomorrow and both of you guys
are very accountable who human beings. I know that one of us
is once accountable to this isn't kind of work. The other
one just, you know, stands at home. I don't know.
Well, I can't wait. I can't wait. I can't wait to read
about the pleasantries on pfft
and I will go
get ready. All right. Thank you.